#my friend told me that this is not a curse nor coincidental but a secret third thing ( a upcoming hyperfixation)

[mysteriouspersonrambles]

Someone PLEASE tell me why the I cannot escape Sonic the Fucking Hedgehog

Like everywhere I go I see him, the mall, the grocery store, even at the fucking park ( I saw a kid with a sonic plush in the sandbox)

Dude I am so busy right now I can’t see your movie I’ve heard it’s good but I can’t go to the theater right now

I literally went to get a haircut today and a saw a kid with a Sonic backpack.

I’m being haunted. How can I not escape this man he’s not even a man it’s a teenage hedgehog please sir I’m just a silly little guy 😭 how do I break this curse

[p---ink]

What’s On Your Mind?

Author’s Note: Hi :) Remember me? I’ve missed you guys, and Tumblr altogether. I felt absolutely guilty about not writing, but the writer’s block was strong on this one guys. And while I’ve had lots of ideas for stories I couldn't quite put them onto paper...or screen. Anyway, wanted to try something new. So this one is about a Thor! I dedicate this one to you @swaggysposts​ since I know you love Chris Hemsworth. Its pretty short, but still, tell me what you think, my love! 

Summary: Avenger reader has a crush on the god of thunder.

Warnings: some lite language and fluff. 

Word Count: 4.7k

Part Two   Part Three

“I’m sorry? Did I hear that right? You said you can what?” Mr. Stark asked, without a doubt forgetting that there were stranger things in the world. 

Clearing my voice, and speaking a bit louder I say, “I can read minds, sir.”

“That’s what I thought you said.” Stark voiced out loud placing a sleek pair of sunglasses on his face. He was still pretty skeptical of my claims, but another part of him was very anxious. Or would the word be embarrassed? Mortified? Yes that was definitely the perfect description.

Whatever the feeling was, I knew the cause was because he knew that if what I was saying was true, he would have to start groveling because of the dirty thoughts that raced through his mind when we first introduced ourselves.  

‘Forgive me for looking Pepper, but this girl has the ass of a professional volleyball player’ was what he thought as he opened the door for me on the way in.

“I can’t hear what you’re thinking though, because It only works through touch.” I lie, as I watch his worry fade away. I needed this job, and I couldn’t be disqualified because of harmless thoughts that we could all be guilty of sometimes. Besides it wasn’t Tony’s fault: these jeans did do wonders for my bottom. 

Something told me though, that if this Pepper weren’t in the picture, he’d have no problem saying what he thought of me out loud. And he was a handsome man, couldn’t be much older than 40, so maybe in another universe I’d consider him. Not this one though. 

“Hey Kid,” Stark started, interrupting my own inappropriate thoughts, “just saying ‘I can read minds’, wont be enough. You’ll have to prove it.”

“Of course! Sorry—” I was cut short by the sound of the thick glass doors of the conference room being slammed against the walls. 

A brown haired boy with deep chestnut eyes, that looked as frantic as the rest of his face, rushed out apology after apology as he took his seat next to the older man. 

Tony, who hadn’t spared the younger boy a glance, said, “Ah, perfect. Tell me what he’s thinking.”

‘Spiderling’ was the name he had assigned him through thought. As I concentrated on his confused features, he looked from me to Stark.

“What who’s thinking? Is Dad—I mean Mr. Stark, referring to me? How could she possibly do that? Oh God, he hasn’t said a word to me since I got here. He must be really upset because I’m late. Geez, I hope he doesn’t take Karen again. I’d rather he kill me.” I repeated, after relaying all of the boy’s thoughts as fast as he could think them. 

“Is she right?” Tony asked the boy. He felt both amazed and amused. Amazed with me, and amused by Spiderling for thinking of him as a dad. He would never let him live that one down. 

After swallowing his astonishment, and turning his attention from me, Spiderling answered “Yes.”

“Good. And at least we both agree on your punishment. I’d rather kill you, too. Saves me less trouble in the future.” Tony stated. He was punishing him because apparently this was the third time he’s been late to the interviews he was supposed to be in charge of. 

Spiderling let alarm overtake his features, but before he could say anything, Tony continued on with more questions. 

“Do you have any other skills, we should know about?”

“Well just a bit of hand to hand combat. But it still needs a lot of work. Other than that no—”

“How did this happen?” Spiderling interrupted, wonder getting the best of him.

“Kid,” Tony starts, but he goes ignored by Spiderling. 

“Were you bitten by some kind of radioactive insect like me? Or are you super smart like Mr. Stark? Or perhaps it was gamma radiation like Dr. Banner! Or maybe a super serum like Mr. Rogers!—”

“Don’t make me remove your batteries, junior!” Tony interrupted, then he looked to me. “I’m sorry. He’ll keep going if you don’t nip it in the bud early.”

But he didn’t have to tell me that. His own mind, like Spiderling’s, was racing a mile a minute. 

“No its fine really. He’s just curious.” I reply with a chuckle. “And to answer your question Spiderling: maybe I was born with it, or maybe its Maybeline.”

I began to grow embarrassed by their silence at my terrible joke, until Spiderling stifled a chuckle. “I get it!” He said between snickers. “Wait why’d you call me Spiderling?” He asked. ‘Is she picking on me?’ He thought. 

Needing to correct his thoughts to clear up any offense I say, “No! I would never pick on you, I just thought that was your name because Mr.—”

“Y/N, was it?” Tony interrupts, yet again. “I think you’d make an excellent addition to our team! When can you start?” 

“Really?” I ask gleaming, ignoring the fact that he wanted me to shut for outing what he really thought of his younger protégé. “I can start right away! Thank you so much for this opportunity!”

“Yeah, don’t mention it.” He hurried. “F.R.I.DAY, will prepare your room, and Peter here will show you around.”

At that Peter hopped to his feet mind racing with thoughts of excitement on the hopes of a future friendship. “Follow me!” He said, grabbing my hand.

“Not so fast, champ. I need to speak with Ms. L/N alone for a moment.” Tony stated, nodding at Peter as he excused himself from the room. 

Tony cleared his throat, and relayed his thoughts, thoughts that were hard to separate from Peter’s louder ones earlier. “So Y/N,” He started towards me, leaning in close as he chose his words carefully. “I couldn’t help but notice, that you didn’t need to touch Parker nor I to read our thoughts. Care to explain?”

Flustered at being caught I stumble across my words as I try to explain, “Ah yes, well its rare, but sometimes I don’t need to touch the person.”

“Mmm.” Tony hummed, not believing a word I said, and I knew then the gig was up.

Cocking my head, and wearing a semi-sympathetic expression I say, “Don’t worry. I don’t even know who Pepper is.” 

And before Stark could protest, I ran to Peter’s side, so we could begin the tour around my new home. 

That was all a little over eight months ago. And so much had changed now. Peter’s hopes became true. We were the best of friends. His boy-like charm never grew old to me, and nor did my gifts to him.

“Cerulean” I’d say, when he’d think things like ‘What’s your favorite color?’. He always thought questions like that as a sort of game. I never got tired of playing along. 

It seemed to never click in his mind though that he could never scare or surprise me when he hid behind corners or couches, because I could hear his thoughts before he got the chance to. 

But besides the little stunts he’d try to pull by hiding his thoughts in order to frighten me, Peter was as transparent as they were. The boy was an open book, and he rarely kept a secret. It made us perfect friends, because he never seemed to get tired of me knowing every single detail about him. 

Though the other avengers treated me like family, Peter seemed to be the only one welcoming of my “gift”. 

If you asked Steve, he’d think something along the lines of “I’m too old for this shit” when I’d answer questions he hadn’t had the chance to ask. Then he’d immediately curse himself, for thinking a swear word when I’d tease him with one of the team’s inside jokes, like “language.”

Bucky tried his hardest to keep his thoughts in a vault, but it never worked. I knew exactly how many dead bodies he had under his belt, and where he kept his hidden stash of plums. 

Natasha, however, never tried to hide her kill count. She always made it a point to up the number by one as a threat to me, every time I accidentally crept inside her head. I always made it a point to keep my distance whenever she was deep in reflection.

Banner was interesting. His mind had two voices of course, and neither one of them gave a shit about whether I heard them or not. There were the deep thoughts that I struggled to understand most of the time, then others were one-word sentences only. They were louder than the rational side of his brain. 

“La, la, la, la, la”, was literally all that Sam would think whenever there was something he wanted to hide. Sometimes he’d do it just to piss me off, because he knew if I said to ‘knock it off’, he could accuse me of evading his thoughts in the first place. 

In truth, I never tried to read what they were thinking. I found the process invasive, and distracting from my own feelings. I worked hard to shut it all out, doing my best to make truth of that lie I told Stark all those months ago. But it was very draining, and took more energy than my body could exert. One person was easy enough to ignore, but more than ten, proved to be a task.

Most of my entire life I spent working in order to shut out all of the world around me. I avoided crowds whenever I could, blasted my music through my headphones whenever I couldn’t, and made sure to drug my body heavily with painkillers and vitamins whenever the last two weren’t options. 

It was so much work just to go out into the world. So much work until I met him. 

The son of Odin was the only person whose thoughts I would pay to hear. Coincidentally, he was also the only person who’s thoughts I couldn’t read. I could never hear him, I would only ever feel him. He radiated a rare intensity I had never felt before. His thoughts, or should I say feelings, even managed to drown out all of those around him. I had no choice but to focus on him whenever he was around. 

When I was with him, he literally clouded my brain. I didn’t have to work to shut him or the others out. He did it for me. 

I usually thought that was refreshing. But in the time I grew to know him, I found it mostly frustrating at times. 

You could say I liked him, but that would be putting it lightly. 

Liking someone for me, was a rare luxury. My crushes were always narrowed down to celebrities, and other people who didn’t know I existed. 

It was a pain to date people whose thoughts about you were always on display.

And if you thought dating was hard as a telepath, try having sex. Imagine being able to hear all of your partner’s most inner thoughts about the faces you make when you cum, or discovering that you have a small birthmark on your ass that you would otherwise know nothing about. 

Yeah, it wasn’t the greatest experience.  

I had never experienced the actual joys of feelings for someone, and wondering if they liked me back. Thor was my first. And chances are, he would never feel the same way. 

He was a literal god, and he lived up to that fact. I was just an average Midgardian, with a silly school-girl crush. It would never happen. 

Silly thing that Fate was. She had to make the only man I found irresistible, unattainable too. What a bitch. 

“Hey. Are you ready?” Natasha asked referring to our daily training. 

“Yes, what’s on the agenda today?” I ask, a bit confused that she isn’t in her workout attire. 

“Well you’ll h–”

“What? Why?” I squeak, before she can finish her thought…well before she can finish her sentence. According to her thoughts, I’d now be training with Odinson.

“I think you’ve graduated from me, kiddo. You can read my thoughts fast enough to predict as well as react to all of my oncoming moves.” Natasha relayed, a hint of sadness detectable through her words. Though she behaved like an older sister to me, she would miss throwing me around on the mat. “We’ll have to see how you do against someone whose actions you can’t predict, just in case that problem comes up out in the field.” She informed me while walking away, before I could confront her. 

“Can’t it be someone else?” I yell to her, but she doesn’t answer. 

“You wound me, Y/N.” That deep familiar voice bellowed from behind me. “And here I thought you enjoyed my company.”

Oh you have no idea, I thought to myself, as I spun on my feet to face him. I craned my neck to peer up at his eyes. One was a pretty hazel, while the other a deep blue. Cerulean. Funny how he’s the reason I’ve grown so fond of the color after all of these months.

“It’s not that I don’t like you. I just don’t think its fair is all. You know? With you being a god.”

“You’re worried you won’t be able to handle me? Do not fret. I wouldn’t dream of giving you more than you could handle.” He said, wiggling his brows suggestively, while flashing a smile. I suppose I failed to mention that he was a massive flirt that could put even Tony Stark to shame. “I promise to take it easy on you.” He furthered, smirking and winking his hazel orb.

“Why do I feel like your idea of taking it easy is vastly different from mine.” I say, trying to settle the butterflies. 

“Whatever you’ve heard about me is nonsense. I’m a merciful master.” He assured.  “We’ll just do some light work today: of course we’ll start with stretching, then 30 laps around the facility to build your stamina, a few hours of work on the machines to build your muscle—because my lady you are a dainty little thing, and then we’ll end the day with an hour or two of sparring.” 

At the sight of my dumbstruck face, Thor says, “I’m sorry that must be too light. How does 50 laps and three hours of sparring, sound?”

“Are you joking?”

“You’re right. I have some matters to attend to on Asgard, but I think we can squeeze in 75 laps, take it or leave it.”

Realizing how deathly serious he was, I quickly say, “I’ll leave it. Let’s get started.”  Deciding to address the subject of excessive training later, I turn to begin my stretches. 

Quiet. As usual. I was alone with my thoughts, which was something that only happened quite literally when I was alone. I couldn’t help but be immensely aware of his presence.

Moments like these i’d die to know what he was thinking. Especially when I could feel his stare. It burned worse than fire on my skin. 

Fire couldn’t compare to his actual touch, however. The same touch I now felt on my upper back.  For a man who weighed over 600 pounds, he was as stealthy as a cat when he wanted to be. His thick fingers against my spine raised goosebumps to my flesh. I would have jumped out of my body if he wasn’t there to keep me grounded. 

“My apologies. It was not my intention to startle you.” He informed, through a deep hearty chuckle. “I just needed to correct your form. Your time on the field will suffer if you continue with your training like this.” 

“Oh.” I replied, tensing a bit as one of his hands traveled around to my stomach and the other pushed against my spine to straighten my posture. My mind was hazy, and if I had even understood the words he spewed a moment ago, that status now changed.

“It all makes me wonder what the Lady Spider has been teaching you.” He continued, as if he didn’t notice the change in my demeanor. “Better.” 

When he stepped away from me, I released a small shaky breath. “What’s on your mind?” He asked. Maybe he did notice the change.

I mentally decided that I would ask him the months-long question I had always wondered about. “What’s on yours.” I state instead of ask, trying to resume my stretches.

“Pardon?” Thor asked. “Do you wonder about what is I ponder? Or is that your answer?

“Both.” I say without hesitation. “Why can’t I read your mind?”

“I’m afraid that’s by design, my lady.”

I stop stretching and turn around to ask, “How?” He had my full attention now. 

Shortly after he corrected my posture, Thor had propped himself up against one of the machines to properly examine my form while I stretched. I tried to ignore how awkward that made me feel. 

“Since an early age I’ve had to learn to guard my thoughts.” He stated. “My brother is the God of Mischief, and Loki often played games of the mind. Mother took notice of how much it was ailing me, and taught me a few useful tricks on how to keep him out. I guess I’ve always practiced them, even in his absence. I don’t know if I even know how to stop it.”

“Oh.” I breathed out. Trying to make sense of his words. 

While I was doing that, he asked,“May I ask why it is you wish to know? I thought you hated your gift.”

“I do. But I guess it still feels odd to not be able to use it on someone. I have no clue what you’re thinking let alone how you feel about me. It unsettles me.” I immediately regretted saying the last part as soon as it was out. 

His reaction did not aid my embarrassment. A thunderous laugh erupted from his throat. It was the kind of laugh that you could feel in your abs, and I knew this because his whole torso shook as it spread through his vocal cords. He was genuinely amused. 

His amusement prompted me to ask, “What’s so funny?”

“How I feel about you.” I think he mutter softly, before following a little louder to himself, “It’s weakened you.” 

“What did you say?” I never had to ask someone to repeat themselves unironically, until I met him. 

“Your ability I mean. It has impaired you.”

“I don’t understand what you mean.”

“I think the word is ‘spoiled’. Yes that seems to be the perfect descriptor.” He teased.

His words made me feel small and silly. Almost insignificant. “Excuse me?”

Sensing my irritation, he quickly told me, “I meant no disrespect. Its just most of your kind and some of mine are not awarded the same privileges that you have. We rely on body language and hidden meanings behind words to determine how someone feels. Well with the exception of me of course, because who would not adore me?” He joked. “But that’s beside the point. You have not yet learned how to read between the lines. Which is why I unsettle you.”

“I know how to read body language, I’m not an idiot.” I say a bit more sharply than I intended. My sense of inferiority getting the best of me.

“I’m not implying that you are, just that if it were not for your talent you would know have known what was on my mind ages ago.”

“That makes no sense. If I couldn’t read minds, i’d be in the same place I am now: unable to know what it is you think.”

“My dear, even if you could read my mind it would make no difference, for I’ve already made my feelings towards you painfully clear. One need not the aid of your capabilities.”

“Thor, could you stop the riddles—”

He ignored my pleas and kept going. “But just to be explicitly clear this time, since obviousness is lost on you—” 

“Stop insulting—”

“I shall tell you how I feel about you.” He stepped and leaned in closer, as if what he was about to say was a secret meant for only my ears.  “Listen closely because I will say this but once, so be wary not to misunderstand: I desire you.” He explained, words dripping with the utmost sincerity. 

My brain started racing. And I suddenly realized just how close he was. “You desire me?” I repeated to myself.

“Yes. I desire you.” He stated again, anticipating my uncertainty. 

If my heart wasn’t beating fast before, it surely was now. My poor ribcage wasn’t built for this.

“A-A-as a friend right?” I stutter out. “Because we aren’t, we aren’t close, like the rest of the team? Yes,” I breathe out. “That has to be what you mean.” I say that last part more to myself than to him. Clearly I’ve misunderstood his words, even though he warned me not to.

“While I would value a companionship, I’m afraid that is not all I mean when I say I desire you.”

“Eerr” Words are hard to form all of the sudden. Stammering out sounds is all that I can do. 

The air around us stilled, and it was pregnant with silence. He gave me a moment to think before asking, “Would you like further explanation.”

“Yes please.” I rush out quickly. “I think that will clear things up a bit more.”

“Right it would. Well If you wish to know what’s on my brain when you’re near, I shall tell you.” His words are teasingly slow, and he knows this.

"But I doubt,” He continues, “i’ll be able to properly convey just how bad I long to be in your presence when you are gone. Just how much I battle myself when it comes to finding any excuse to touch you. As you know, I lost one of those battles today. I don’t know if you can handle, just how much I imagine your warm embrace to be. How tender I’ve imagined your lips to feel. I just know them to be softer than rose petals and sweeter than nectar.”

“In fact,” He started. I could almost physically see the lightbulb go off over his head. And then, he began ridding us of the rest of our space, extending his long arm to snake around my waist, and pulling me against his chest at a speed faster than lighting. “If it’s okay with you, I’d like to put that theory to test.”

It was like a lucid dream. I was only allowed to watch everything play out before me, without the luxury of making any actions myself. It took great focus on my part to even will my head to move. My nod was so subtle I was unsure if he could even see it. But the God of Thunder had more than enough to go off on.

He joined the hand around my waist with his other, and shortly after I could feel my feet rise from the ground. My hands that were previously glued to his chest, found their place behind his neck to support the rest of my body. His head met me the rest of the way, before he blanketed his lips over mine.  

He released one of the hands around my waist, to bring it up to my face. His fingers, now fastened to my jaw, slightly parted my lips allowing him to further explore my mouth with his. As massaged my tongue with his own, I could feel his eyelashes dance across my cheeks. That’s how close he was.

Most beards are scratchy and rough, but his felt like silk against my skin. His lips were even softer, and were like velvet in comparison. 

I inhaled the scent of rain on freshly cut grass. It reminded me of dewy meadows and Irish springs. His touch was firm, but he managed to hold me with care, like a bull who had trained for years with the sole purpose of entering a china shop. 

He tasted like what summer felt like, if you could make sense of it. The kiss had the same intensity behind severe thunderstorms. Beautiful but deadly. I found myself teetering on the edge of a cliff: desperate to chase this thrill, but also wary of whether or not it was worth dying for. 

I mentally decided that I could expire in his arms, and be perfectly content with that decision.

I got more into it. I thought that if this was a dream I’d take full advantage of it. Surely dream Thor would be fine with me taking over the kiss. It felt only natural. 

I decided it was time for my tongue to do the exploring. My lips needed to memorize the feel of his. My hands wanted to study every strand of hair that lived on the nape of his neck. That was only fair right?

I was enjoying his embrace so much, that I mistook the spinning in my head for shock from kissing a god, instead of the telltale signs of an impending headache. The lack of air in my lungs was because he took my breath away in a figurative sense, instead of the literal physical sense it actually was. The ache that spread throughout my body wasn’t because of the suffocating grip he had to keep me pressed to his chest, but because our bodies were on the brink of fusing into one. 

On second thought, maybe dying in his arms is more painful than I previously thought. 

I tapped out, and he immediately released me, placing me gently on the ground. I struggled for air, but it was like he didn’t miss a beat. Not a drop of sweat in sight on his gorgeous face. Instead, I could see a bright smile forming. 

“Are my thoughts clear enough, now?” He asked, breaking out into smirk.

But I had no time to acknowledge his joke, for I could feel reality setting back in. And reality is, I was a flustered fuck. 

“I’m sorry.” I stammered. “I must be holding you from your business on Asgard!”

“What? No—”

But he had no time to argue, for in a flash I was already gathering my gym bag and heading for the door.

“What about your training?” I heard him yell.

“I’m sorry! Maybe another time!” And after that, I practically sprinted to get out of earshot before he could protest or stop me. 

I raced passed Peter who was on his way into the gym. “Y/N! Are you okay?” I heard him yell. But what was strange is that I couldn’t hear him think it, despite being more than enough distance away from Thor.

“I’m fine.” I yelled back, hoping he wouldn’t follow. Maybe Peter’s mouth was faster than his thoughts.

No. That wasn’t it, because as I raced through the tower, everyone’s minds were silent, even though they were chatting casually with one another. That never happened. 

I burst through the nearest lady’s room, desperate to calm my nerves, when I saw Natasha applying red lipstick.  The action by itself wasn’t disturbing, but the expression she wore was.

“Don’t tell the others.” She voiced, in a threatening tone.

“Don’t tell the others what?” I asked confused. Maybe she’d be able to take my mind off of things. 

She looked at me like I had grown two heads, much like the first day we met when I proved that I could read her thoughts. “I know you read them. But this is different Y/N, the guys will never let me live this one down.”

“Nat, what are you talking about?”

“I’m talking about the date.”

“You’re going on a date?” No wonder she was so panicked. The woman was more comfortable with killing than she was with being vulnerable.

“Yes—What is wrong with you?” She half-yelled, interrupting herself as if she just realized something was wrong.

I had, had enough with trying to not think about him, because the task was damn near impossible so I decided to just say it. “Thor admitted his feelings for me. And then we kissed!” I cried. 

Oh, Nat mouthed, taking a more comfortable position against the bathroom sink. She leaned against its counter, and crossed her arms,“And now you can’t take your mind off of him.”

It was my turn to look at her like she was a lunatic. “How did you know that? Are you a mind-reader too?”

Song for the Chapter: Waiting For You by the Aces:  Pretty Self-explanatory lyrics. Think of the song from Thor’s POV

part II

A/N: If you made it this far, don’t be afraid to tell me what you think :)

[obxsummer]

Our Secret // John B. Routledge

word count: 2.6k

pairing: john b routledge x maybank!reader

warnings: lots of cursing, descriptive physical child abuse, mentions of sex, angry!JJ, angst

summary: you thought you were doing so well hiding your relationship from your brother. after an amazing day with your boyfriend, you come to realize that jj’s not as oblivious as you predicted which ends in the worst argument you’ve ever witnessed.

request: hiiiii a request where you’re seeing john b in secret because you’re jj’s sister and then jj finds out?

masterlist

ask me anything

--

“I swear to God if you leave a hickey, JJ’s going to murder your ass.”

John B laughed, his lips pressed against your neck as he hovered over you, one hand holding him up as the other rested on your cheek. “I’m not that dumb. Plus, he can’t murder someone if he doesn’t know who to murder.”

This isn’t the typical post-sex conversation most couples had but for you and John B, it was normal. The past five months had involved a lot of lying, skipping plans, faking sicknesses, and a lot of concealer to keep your relationship hidden from prying eyes. There were two main reasons everything was secret: one, no Pogue on Pogue macking and two, your brother would literally punt John B into another country. 

It wasn’t that JJ was against you dating anyone, but he definitely wouldn’t appreciate the fact that at the end of the day you were crawling under the sheets with his best friend. You couldn’t help it though. Being with John B was literally intoxicating and you found yourself needing more every single moment you were with him.

There had been many close calls, but somehow, you had managed to keep your secret thus far and you weren’t planning on spilling anytime soon. Although it sucked to keep your hands to yourself when you were with your other friends and your brother, it was worth it when the two of you spent time alone.

“John B? You here?” 

John B’s hand was over your mouth before you could even scream in surprise. He held a finger to his lips in a sign to be quiet as he pushed off of you. You quickly got up, pulling a shirt over your head as you snuck into the bathroom.

While your boyfriend left the room to confront your brother, you took a moment to adjust your appearance in the mirror. You rolled your eyes, spotting an already darkening mark on the dip of your collarbones where John B had definitely ignored your warnings, not that you minded, it just took a little additional effort to cover up.

Sighing, you leaned against the wall as you listened to the muffled conversation going on through the wall. After a few brief minutes, there was a knock on the door before it opened, revealing John B’s exhausted figure.

“He’s gone,” He mumbled as he walked towards you. “Sorry about that.”

You laughed, wrapping your arms around his neck before kissing him softly. “It’s my brother, my problem. I probably should be going anyway. He’ll get suspicious here soon.”

“Yet you’ll end up back on my couch around midnight,” He mumbled against your lips, hands rubbing your back. “I wish I could do more for you guys.”

“Letting us crash here is more than enough,” You responded, “It means I get to see you even longer.”

John B hugged you tighter to his chest and rested his chin on your head. He hated knowing that you and JJ feared going home. Even before the two of you were dating, he couldn’t stand the fact that you could possibly end up with a black eye or a bruised rib. Your dad always blamed harming JJ on the fact that he looked like your mom, but at the end of the day, you were her splitting image. Sometimes he couldn’t tell if it was actually her again or just you hiding in the shadows.

It freaked JJ out. Knowing that you weren’t safe from the hands of your own dad was hard, but for your brother, he couldn’t stand it. There were countless times JJ would walk through the front door so you could sneak in the window, or he would take the blame for a broken dish with the idea that your dad would react even worse if he knew it was you. You were overwhelmed with guilt knowing that your brother put himself on the front of the battle every single time to keep you safe. You hated knowing JJ was bruised and bleeding because of you.

“Be safe, okay? I’ll be here if you need me.”

Once you had all of your stuff and clothes were returned, the walk back to your house was one filled with anxiety and nerves. You knew JJ was home from the bike outside and you managed to sneak in without a peep, your dad crashed on the couch completely asleep. You exhaled and tiptoed to your room without another word.

“Where the hell have you been?” JJ hissed as he stood in the doorway of his room. “I’ve been looking for you.”

You rolled your eyes. “I told you I was going to the beach for a walk, chill. And what exactly do you want?”

“Did the horny seagulls give you a hickey?” His finger pressed against the dark spot on your neck. You rolled your eyes and shoved his hand away. He wasn’t actually looking for you, he just wanted to give you shit. 

“Fuck off, JJ,” You mumbled before going into your room and shutting the door without another word. You weren’t in the mood to deal with him, nor were you up to covering your tracks. You flopped on the bed with a groan, still sleepy from your day with John B. You closed your eyes and allowed sleep to take over.

--

Waking up was a whole new adventure. Voices were shouting, glass broke somewhere along the lines and it had you on your feet in seconds. Throwing open your door, you walked straight into someone’s back causing you to stumble slightly.

“What’s going on?” You mumbled, still half asleep. You had run into JJ, who turned to glare at you with an anger you haven’t seen before. You stood next to him so you could get a clear view of the scene.

“What’s going on is your brother is screaming like a maniac for no goddamn reason!” Your dad shouted, pointing at JJ who was already sporting a black eye. He had clearly been woken up from his nap early and one of you would pay for it with more than a bruised eye.

Your brother ignored your dad, however, and instead was still attempting to murder you with his eyes. “Wanna explain this?” The dark blue piece of fabric dangling in his hand sent a chill through you as you recognized John B’s bandana in between his fingers.

“It’s John B’s? So what?” You tried to play it off but deep down, you knew you were screwed. “We’re with him all the time, JJ. That’s not abnormal.”

“No, but it is abnormal that I’m finding his clothing in your room, hickeys on your neck, and you’re both coincidentally ‘busy’ at the same time on most days. So what the hell is it, Y/N?” JJ was yelling now and you were becoming increasingly terrified. Your brother never got angry with you, not like this. “What are you hiding from me?”

“Great, now I’m letting a whore live in this fuck up of a house!” Your dad reentered the conversation to give his two cents. “I fucking knew I shouldn’t have let your mother talk me into keeping you. You’ve turned into nothing but a worthless piece of shit who just takes up space and wastes money!”

His hand clamped around the collar of your t-shirt as he shoved you against the wall, his saliva landing on your cheeks as he continued to scream. A large hand tightened around your throat, cutting off your airway as he held you off the ground. “You’re a slut, you hear me? Fucking your brother’s best friend like the piece of trash you are.” 

“Dad!” JJ’s voice echoed in your ears as you struggled in the harsh grip, your vision spotty as you tried to kick your way to freedom. Your brother was pulling against your dad’s shoulder to get him to let go, a panicked look in his eyes at the image before him.

“Stop,” You gasped as you shoved your hand out, barely hitting your father’s chin as you attempted to get any air. “Please.”

Your weak body collided with the floor where you choked for oxygen. The battle wasn’t over until multiple harsh kicks were landed on your ribs and back. You cried out and curled into a ball. The world slowly became still as you managed to get to your feet before darting out the door without another look. Knowing running wouldn’t help your already damaged situation, you threw your leg over the seat of JJ’s bike, thankful that he left the keys in the ignition before speeding away towards the only place you could find help.

John B was swaying in the hammock when you pulled up in a frenzy, leaving barely enough time to kill the engine before you were scrambling towards him. “Y/N?” He was pushing himself out of the hammock to meet you halfway when you crashed into him, heavy sobs leaving your chest as you held on to him tightly. 

“I’m sorry! I tried to stop it a-and-” 

“Shhh,” John B held your head against his chest as he rubbed your back in an attempt to calm you down. “You’re okay, baby. I’m right here. Calm down.”

You weren’t sure how long you stood there, but it was enough time for your breathing to slow and JJ to get his ass over to the chateau. His heart broke as he watched you stand there and cry in his best friend’s arms. JJ never wanted to hurt you, and he never wanted to set you in a situation where your father could hurt you, yet that’s exactly what he did. He felt awful and seeing the already forming bruises around your throat made him want to throw up.

“Little?” The nickname left JJ’s lips unconsciously. He had called you that for years ever since someone said you looked like the smaller version of him as a kid. He never let you live it down, always calling you “little” or “mini-me”. JJ was so grateful to have you in his life but he hated that it took until now for him to realize how much he needed you.

At the sound of your brother’s voice, you hugged your boyfriend even tighter causing John B to look at the new presence. Seeing your brother, he frowned yet didn’t shift to remove you from his arms. Whatever happened upset you severely and if this was how JJ found out about the two of you, then this was how JJ was going to find out.

John B’s fingers tapped the side of your thigh, a signal between the two of you that was unspoken but simply understood. You jumped from the ground into his suspecting arms as he carried you like a koala back to the hammock before settling in. It took some adjusting before you both were comfortable with him laying on his back and you resting on his chest. His lips pressed against your forehead as he continued to rub your back in a calming manner.

JJ stood in shock as he watched the interaction between you. Never would he imagine this, but watching you and John B was like watching a cheesy rom-com. It looked so right, and it was this moment when JJ realized how badly he fucked up in reacting out of anger.

“Hey,” John B mumbled as he watched JJ lose his control on his emotions on the steps of the chateau. “Pretty girl, you gotta let me see what happened.” The bruises on your skin didn’t go unnoticed to him but he wanted to wait a bit before talking to you about it. With a shaky breath you sat back on the hammock and let John B pull your t-shirt over your head to reveal your bruised stomach and chest. Some spots were red where skin was torn and your neck clearly revealed the outline of a hand.

“Fuck,” JJ cursed at himself as he ran a hand through his messy blond hair, tears of his own falling from his eyes as he realized what just happened. At the sight of your injuries, he lost it. He swore to protect you, to keep you out of his father’s cruel hands if it was the last thing he did and he failed. He failed because he was so pissed over you having a relationship and not telling him. “Little, I’m so sorry.”

You forced yourself to look over at your older brother before carefully stepping down from the hammock. John B followed you, handing back your t-shirt as you walked over to JJ and wrapped him in a hug. “It’s not your fault.”

“But it is!” JJ argued as he let you hold onto him. “I shouldn’t have even brought it up in front of him, that’s so fucked up, Y/N! I stood there, a-and I just let him because I was so pissed that you were fucking John B behind my back. Fuck! I’m so stupid!”

You shook your head, tears falling again as your brother finally broke in your arms and hugged you back, the two of you crying together. “I should’ve told you,” You mumbled into his shoulder. “It’s not just fucking around, J. I promise. He makes me really, really happy, and I should’ve just told you from the start.”

“We both should have,” John B interrupted as he stood a few feet away and observed the scene. “I’m sorry, JJ. I promise you this isn’t just some hook-up thing. I really love her, man.”

You smiled slightly at his words. The two of you had yet to say I love you to each other, as cheesy as that was, but standing here in the moment, you knew you loved John B. You loved him more than anything, enough that you were willing to risk your relationship with your brother because of it.

“It’s okay, man,” JJ sniffled as he pulled away from the hug, instead adjusting to hold you to his chest so he could have the small bit of comfort knowing you were okay. “It’s not worth an argument over. I’m really happy for you, trust me. Just wish this could’ve been in different circumstances.

“And I’m so sorry for letting that happen, Little. I never ever want to see you in that position again, and I’m sorry I let it happen in the first place like. Fuck!” JJ pulled at his hair in frustration. “I’m such a fucked up brother!”

“You are not!” You defended as you stepped away from him. “JJ, there’s been so many times where you take the damage instead of me, even if I deserve it. You can’t blame yourself for our shitty dad. It’s not your fault, it never will be your fault.”

John B shook his head. “You never deserve it. Neither of you do. Just stay here, yeah? You don’t have to go back.”

JJ wrapped an arm around your shoulders and kissed the side of your head. “I’m sorry.”

You shoved him away and gave him a light punch to the arm. “Would you stop apologizing? It’s nobody’s fault. Look, let’s just go inside and chill, okay?”

“Fine, but if I find out that there’s more hickeys on your neck tomorrow, I will bust someone’s ass, you hear me, John B?”

“JJ! Shut up!”

[speechlessxx]

Delicate. (Henry Cavill x Reader)

Summary: Following a break up, the reader finds herself in a delicate position as she contemplates if moving on is the right thing to do.

Warnings: exboyfriend!Chris Evans (he’s barely in this lol), mention of cheating, very inaccurate Chris Evans, implied famous (actress)!reader, kinda fluffy, y’all know i love taylor swift and i’m not apologetic about it, very wordy (i haven’t written a fic in like 2 weeks give me a break). this is lowkey a dumpster fire but i’m trying

This was originally a Chris fic, but since Taylor’s man is a brit, I thought it was rather fitting. 

Inspired by you guessed it Delicate – Taylor Swift

Word Count: 2.3k

AHH! My first Henry fic omg

Ko-fi - donations are appreciated but not necessary!

The night sky was a dark grey accompanied by an array of sporadic lightning followed by claps of deafening thunder. Your heels contrasted the roars of the city as they patted lightly against the concrete. Goosebumps painted your skin as the air suddenly chilled and the rain began its descent.

In a matter of minutes, you were drenched, but you paid it no mind. Despite the awful situation and the heavy storm, something told you it would be worth it. 

Your phone buzzed just as you turned the corner. You fumbled with the device, not caring if the storm ruined your clothes or your makeup. A small smile found its way onto your face as you read through the water droplets that decorated your phone screen.

Come here, you can meet me in the back.

You hurriedly but carefully ran in the rain, shrugging off your trench coat to use as a makeshift cover – not that it made much of a difference. You were still soaked.

You began to regret the heels, cursing your friends for convincing you to go to a party where you coincidentally ran into your ex-boyfriend. However, you were convinced it was no happy accident but a horribly planned ambush.

He begged for a moment of your attention, and out of respect for your short history, you obliged. Regret was perfectly painted across his features as he pulled you aside. The lines of his face accentuated his remorse and emphasized his apologies, but they fell to deaf ears. You had pulled your arm from his grip and shook your head.

“It’s over, Chris,” you told him with a steady voice. It startled him. He had expected a stormy rage like the one now in the sky. “I forgive you for cheating, but it’s… it’s over.”

It had been weeks since his scandal – one that inexplicably tarnished your own reputation – but you were over it. It felt good to say it out loud – to say it to him.

The red neon sign illuminated the darkness. The bar’s name reflected in the puddles on the street. You took a deep breath as a fluttering feeling – butterflies – erupted throughout your whole body. This feeling – the nervous tingling that triggered a rush of serotonin – was reserved for one person.

And he was right through those doors.

-=+=-

The scent of various alcoholic drinks hung in the air. Unlike the cold and stormy city, the inside of the bar was warm – it felt as if it were like a home.

The bar wasn’t crowded though it wasn’t deserted either. People were huddled in their respective groups. Despite hobbling in drenched from the storm, no one paid you any attention – something you weren’t necessarily used to, but you could definitely grow accustomed to it – though some did shoot a curious glance your way because of the door suddenly opening and closing. But it stopped at that – just a glance before turning their attention back to their company.

You cracked a smile. You understood why he chose this place. A public place filled with people who were either too drunk to care or too busy to notice you. No cameras flashing, prying eyes, judgmental stares, and whispers. It was a nice change from the overly published relationship you walked away from.

You felt his eyes on you even before you even laid eyes on him. His stare was burning as if he ignited a fire beneath you. 

You cringed, suddenly becoming insecure about the smudged makeup – you undoubtedly had mascara and eyeliner running down your cheeks due to the rain. But nevertheless, you made your way to the back of the bar, keeping your head low.

“(Y/N).” He stood, wrapping his arms tightly around you. You closed your eyes and returned the embrace, savoring the warmth. “Look at you, you’re drenched.”

Yeah and look at you, you thought. Though he wasn’t fancied up – he wore dark jeans and a pair of Nikes, inconspicuous at its finest. – he was easily one of the most handsome men you’d ever seen.

“Kinda happens when you stupidly think you can outwalk the rain,” you chided, and he chuckled in response. The rumbling of his chest vibrated through you. You were the first to pull away, but his grip around your body kept you anchored. Your body flush against his.

He frowned, tilting his head curiously. His hands moved from around you to cup your cheeks. His thumbs gently brushed away the clumped and smudged makeup that collected under your eyes. You stared up into his eyes – god, have they always been that blue?

“Henry,” you finally said, turning your head side to side to escape from his hands. “It’s nice to see you again.”

“Likewise,” he nodded as if you two hadn’t seen each other in a long time (it had only been a few days). He took a step back and pulled out your seat for you just before situating himself in the stool next to yours. “So, how was that party?”

You shivered as the bar’s doors opened and closed as a group of friends wandered off into the storm. Just as the door shut, you heard a boom of thunder that rattled the building – glasses shook along with it. Henry immediately took notice and grabbed his jacket off the back of his chair and wrapped it around you. 

You thanked him, relishing in his cologne. Your heart nearly jumped out of your chest when he adjusted his seat closer to yours so he could drape one arm over your shoulder, slightly pulling you into him but not so much that you were falling out of the stool.

Warmth immediately rushed through you. You felt it rise to your cheeks. It felt as if you were radiating – glowing.

“Yeah, I really shouldn’t have went.” You admitted before smiling at the bartender and reciting your order – to which Henry added to put it on his tab. “You don’t need to do that.”

“I dragged you out to the east side. It’s the least I could do.” He dismissed. His opposite hand absentmindedly reached over and pushed a wet strand of hair behind your ear. You raised an eyebrow questioningly at him as he unabashedly admired you. 

“You’re so beautiful.”

You gaped at the compliment. It was abrupt and sudden.

Although you and Henry had fluttered around each other like moths to flames for the past several weeks that followed your breakup, neither of you had been so … open. Sure, the secret meet ups were an indication that something else lied underneath, but the sudden “you’re so beautiful” was so forthright that it startled you.

“I look like a wet dog,” you deadpanned, thanking the bartender as he brought you your drink. You carefully took a sip of the bourbon. Your hands were shaking though at this point you weren’t sure if it was because of the rain-soaked clothes or that nervous feeling gnawing at your heart.

“Wet dog, or not. You’re still beautiful.”

“You’re drunk.” You dismissed with a laugh that quickly faded when your eyes wandered to his barely touched pint. “Or not?”

His brows were drawn up. His eyes left no indication that he was even slightly buzzed – and the look on his face told you he was serious. “Why are you so hell bent on pushing me away? Unless you’re leading me on though I don’t think that’s the case. But I think I’ve been very clear that I’m interested.”

Again, his sudden outburst stunned you, forcing you to break eye contact as an embarrassed expression glazed over your face.

You weren’t stupid though. You saw the signs – his very clear signals (ones that you reciprocated though never spoke out about). You both knew that the interest was mutual, but it was a matter of taking that step – having that conversation.

But you were afraid of the backlash. Your previous relationship with Chris Evans had left fans with such a sour impression of you. The relationship was sudden – no implications, nor hints. It was purely out of the blue – tabloids describing it as “a whirlwind romance” – and it truthfully was.

You threw yourself into a relationship with what was a stranger – an actor who was charming and kind but quite the flirt – and got your heartbroken in the process. And because of your blank slate of a dating history – and you, the new blank slate in general – it was easy to paint you as the villain.

You were afraid that jumping into something serious with Henry would fan the flames of your already burning reputation. You saw how the industry portrays women – move on too slow, you’re bitter; move on too fast, you’re an easy slut.

You couldn’t win.

“Because I like you.” It was your turn to be open, to be abrupt, and honest. You took another sip. You needed an extra push – that liquid courage – to look over at him. His raised brows had now scrunched together in confusion as he tried to decipher the deeper meaning to that. “No, Hen, like really like you…”

You felt like you were in primary school again. He was that crush – that best friend you told yourself you didn’t want though it was all just blind denial. You refrained from saying “I like like you” like a child would’ve feeling as if you’d never live down that embarrassment.

“I don’t see how that could be a reason why you’re holding back?” He asked, his voice low. His eyes finally broke away from yours as he nervously glanced around the room. Only to find reassurance that everyone still was off in their own worlds – no care for the intimate conversation that you were having.

“Because I’m afraid that when everything blows up like it did with …” you didn’t bother to say his name. You both knew it anyway. “Like it did with him that … you won’t want me – “

“How would we know if you won’t give it the chance?” It was a legitimate question. One you had no answer to. “From where I stand and from what I’ve seen, we can walk through their fires, we can dodge their pitchforks – they’re witch hunt be damned.” He said, blue eyes wide and staring into yours so intensely. The speck of brown in his iris was so noticeable in this light. “I just want you. I want to be with you.”

“You say that now – “

“I’ll say it now and I’ll say it tomorrow… Then the next day, then the next.” You laughed at his corniness as he reeled his arm from your shoulders to take your hands in his, giving them a reassuring squeeze. “I’ll keep saying it until you don’t want me to say it.”

“You’re dramatic.”

He chuckled. “I’m truthful.”

“I don’t want to lose our friendship.”

“How about I raise you a deal, hm? We try this out, give it a run. If it works, then it works,” he smiled and you couldn’t help but return a toothy grin. “And in the off chance that it doesn’t, then we’ll still be friends.”

“Easier said than done. What if we have a bad break up?”

Henry scoffed and rolled his eyes at your pessimism. “It won’t happen.”

“Henry – “

“I don’t plan on letting you go. So, bad break up is really off the table. What do you say?”

“Anyone tell you you’d make a decent salesman?”

“(Y/N).” His tone became jokingly stern at your attempted deflection.

“Okay, okay!” You laughed.

“Think of all the fun we can have.” Henry continued.

“On the condition, that this is all private, but seeing as you’re you, I’ll take the closest to private as we can get.” You told him. “Last relationship, I was being watched like a hawk. I don’t want that to be us.”

“I can’t make that promise. But I can promise that we can try our best. It’s doable, I’m sure, but everyone has their ways of finding out.”

“Okay.” You nodded. “We’ll give this a spin.”

“In that case, let’s head back to my hotel.”

Your eyes bulged. “Henry, buddy, let’s take it slow.” You said, emphasizing the last word.

His shoulders bounced as he began to chuckle. “I didn’t mean it in that way…” A small blush crept onto his cheeks as the both of you continued to laugh. “I meant … let’s go somewhere private.”

“Doesn’t help your case.” You laughed harder.

“Maybe it’s just your mind that’s in the gutter.”

-=+=-

The night was spent like how all your secret meetings went – laughing at one another, sharing stories and secrets. You enjoyed Henry’s company and getting to know him outside of a screen.

You two stayed up all night relishing in each other’s presence. The laughter was addicting. The happy chemicals in your brain made your cheeks sore from the smiles.

You woke up before he did. The incessant buzzing of your cell phone dragging you out from your sleep. You sent the call from your friends – who were probably wondering where you ran off to after the party – to voicemail before silencing your phone. You wanted to savor this moment – this peace – for a little while longer.

You turned in the bed and smiled to yourself. His face was laxed as he slept. Soft snores escaped him. He was truly a work of art.

You wondered if he was dreaming of you like you were of him. You wondered if his words, his confessions, whatever this would evolve into held any weight. You were always so good at knowing when someone was lying to you, so when Henry looked you in the eyes and told you he wanted to be with you, something told you to believe him – something told you to make him yours.

He suddenly shuffled, startling you once again. He swung an arm around your waist, pulling you closer to him. 

“Yeah, I still want you,” he muttered. 

You grinned. Maybe you won after all.

[good-times-with-theo]

Black Gold (Chapter Three)

Sydney Boutique Hotel; Sydney, Australia, 3:39 A.M.

Another day, another dollar, as they said. Australia was so uncomfortable with wearing suits and ties, as according to the UN and the Commonwealth of Nations dress code, so the second he always got home, he changed into his usual outfits. The outfits consisted of shorts, t-shirts, and savannah hats. Boots and socks, occasionally. Of course, since he was still trying to find a house for himself, he had to live in a hotel room by himself. The Australian States, or his kids, were all grown up and had their own houses. Mainly because they had the chance to go to college at a young age, unlike their father, who had to fight in both World Wars before even considering university so he could get a well-paying job to support his kids. That was well over 70 years ago now, and here he was: a broke college student trying to find a home so he can stop living at this cursed hotel. Australia sat down on his couch and grabbed his phone, immediately getting a call that was rather coincidental to when he always grabbed his phone out. He answered the phone, only to be greeted by a scream and then the line going dead. “What in the bloody..?” Australia muttered, looking at his phone to see who the caller really was. He felt his heart drop to his stomach when he saw it was from his older brother, New Zealand. What had happened? Australia quickly changed before heading outside, only to find his brother surprisingly okay. “Zealand? What even happened?” Australia asked worriedly. “I heard a scream and--” New Zealand couldn’t help but chuckle. “Australia. That was my Halloween voicemail. Sorry about that.”

“You can’t scare me like that, mate! Do you know how terrified I was?!”

“Haha, yeah, I know. Sorry. I’ll change it. Anyway, we have to go to the Commonwealth of Nations building. Again.”

Australia sighed in annoyance. He didn’t even bother changing back into his suit, mainly because he knew that doing such a task would just delay him and his brother from getting there on time. He got into the passenger seat of his brother’s car, which was a 2010 Ford colored in navy blue that their father had given New Zealand.

Commonwealth of Nations, London, United Kingdom; 7:19 P.M.

After a long drive to the airport, plus a 23-hour long flight from Sydney to London, Australia and New Zealand finally made it in time for the meeting. Of course, they had to stay with their parents until that Sunday, which meant that they would be in their childhood bedroom that they shared for about three to four whole days, plus today, making it five. “Ah, hello, Australia and New Zealand,” Brunei greeted them formally at the door. The two brothers greeted Brunei as they kept walking. Of course, due to Australia’s much taller height than his brother, he saw their father first. “What’s been going on?” Australia immediately asked. “Mom said that you left for London after America had a World War I bomb in his house, then you went missing for three days.” The UK sighed. “Yeah, I know. I went on a secret mission in Buenos Aires with Argentina to figure out certain fault lines. I just returned an hour ago, and now I have a meeting to attend despite my lack of sleep and energy,” the Brit replied, looking at his son.

“Well, what’s going on anyway? You know, with China and Southeast Asia?”

“It’s a long story. Basically, China’s power over the world has been increasing tensions within Asia, Europe, and even North and South America. Even Central America is starting to grow uneasy with China’s growing power. Though, little can be done to stop such a global superpower. The Middle East has been getting worse with the tensions, especially between Bangladesh and Pakistan. The two, once united as father and son, have been arguing due to India’s grip on Bangladesh. I’m sure you know of China’s intentions with the Philippines and North Korea. If not, then that’s a whole other story I’d rather not get into at the moment. In other words besides my own, the world is going on complete lockdown, and that’s all because of Russia and other OPEC members trying to gain Wyomingite oil for their own profits.”

Australia couldn’t believe what he was hearing. Though, China had the tightest grips on himself, his father, and Canada. The three had all been easily manipulated into thinking that China could do no wrong, even when he had been one of the reasons the Cold War even began back in the late 1940s. “Wow,” was all the Australian would say to such a situation. “Mr. UK, Mr. Australia,” Sri Lanka suddenly said to the two. “You’re both needed in Pakistan’s office immediately.” The two nodded, quickly walking to Pakistan’s office in the Middle Eastern section of the Asian Wing. They both hoped it was nothing serious, but who knows. They could both be in deep, deep trouble the second they enter that office.

After a 10-minute elevator ride from the Oceania and European Wings, the two swiftly made their way to Pakistan’s office, knocking on the door before entering. “Pakistan. You called us?” The UK asked firmly. “Yes, yes. Come in. The door isn’t locked,” Pakistan replied from the office. Australia walked in with his father. “What seems to be the issue?” Australia asked.

“Well, I called you two here specifically because of China’s tight, tight grip on us all. Firstly, with the UK. His grip on you is the tightest; always has been, always will be. If you disobey anything he says, your economy will collapse, and so will your nation.”

The UK visibly flinched at the thought. “I know. He also owns half of Australia’s land and helps with his economy as well, whilst he is merely your ally whom you have been having particularly horrid tension within recent years,” he said.

“I know, which is what I would like to acknowledge. His grip on Australia is almost as tight as yours, whilst his on me is hardly even considered a grip. Merely, I am just a puppet for his control. Australia must do everything China says, or else his economy will suffer greatly, but could possibly recover if Australia was forgiven by China for certain actions that he could possibly commit. For example, Australia could make propaganda about China’s communist government, which means that Australia is speaking out against a government that forbids such an act of treason against the Supreme Leader, or the dictator as many other democratic nations refer to them as. If that were to be the case of a situation, China could cut off all trade within Australia’s land, shut down factories, and stop network services, which could cause banks to close and many other tragic collapses in the government. The Australian stock market could collapse, and your own son would be in so much debt that he would never be able to pay it back,” Pakistan said.

Australia stepped a small bit closer to the UK. “Well, what about you?” Australia finally said with enough effort to speak once again. “What will happen if you disobey China?” “Simple,” Pakistan replied. “I will be executed in front of my daughters, Islamabad and Karachi, and my daughters will suffer greatly because of my own actions that were intended to be against China himself, or his government. I do not wish to die in front of my young daughters when even they cannot grasp the idea of death nor grief at such a young age.”

The UK sighed. “We need to deal with China before it’s too late. He could go to America next or even France. He could even reach U.S cities and states,” he said firmly. “He already has,” Australia replied quietly. “Georgia and a few other U.S States rely on China to live. He is their best trading partner. I mean, it’s better than who Louisiana trades with.”

“Who does that boy trade with?” The UK asked hesitantly.

“Saudi Arabia. One of the worst countries ever. He only asks for sand and weapons, which Louisiana, along with Uncle Scotland and a few others, are struggling to keep as their main exports to Saudi Arabia. Especially now since Riyadh, who is Saudi’s son, is now in charge whilst his father is in custody,” Australia answered. Now, it was up to those three to lead a revolution, whether they died in it, or died after it. They needed to break China’s control.

This is only because China is the reason as to why families are being ripped apart, why children are becoming orphans like Riyadh, and even why brothers and sisters are betraying one another for land, just like China had done to Taiwan during the Chinese Civil War.

It was their job to either save the world or let everyone become puppets to China.

Cape Town, South Africa; 5:24 P.M.

Even African countries had fallen prey to China’s manipulation. Well, most of them except for a few others. South Africa was one of them. He was the most famous of the African continent and knew exactly why. Though, he hardly spoke and had a rather formal nature to him, possibly because of the British influence on his country. “Greetings, South Africa!” Egypt said proudly, taking a formal bow to the man. “I’m sure you have heard of recent news involving our dear neighbors in the Middle East; Pakistan if I may specify.” South Africa looked up from his work. “Let me guess: China’s taken control again and is causing tension within Southeast Asia and the rest of the world?” He asked in a formal tone. “Good guess! A correct one indeed, Sir!” Egypt replied happily. “Well, I have come to inform you that the United Nations leaders have called you and Somalia to represent all of Africa. Of course, I envy you, but I do not wish to cause sabotage upon you nor our dear Somalian friend!” The two countries suddenly heard a car rolling up in the driveway. Somalia’s car. “Ah! Speaking of our Somalian buddy!” Egypt said with a bright smile, going to the door and letting Somalia in with a bow. “Greetings, Somalia, sir!” Egypt said proudly. Somalia just nodded and went to South Africa. “Hey. I’m sure our messenger here told you about the recent news and the calling of our presence for the representation of the entire continent, right?” Somalia said formally. South Africa nodded. “How will we represent 54 total countries on a supercontinent, though? All of them have different opinions, different claims, and even different ideologies,” he said. Somalia sighed. “I’m not sure,” he replied quietly. “We could ask all of them about the current situation and see which decision has the most. In that case, then we go with that.” South Africa got a pen, paper, and a clipboard. He quickly put the piece of paper on the clipboard and held his pen in his hand. “That’s the best option we have,” he said. “Egypt!” The South African said firmly. Egypt looked up from getting the mail. “Get one of the cars. One of the business ones. I’m sure you know which airport to take us to by now,” South Africa commanded. Egypt nodded, swiftly going out to the garage with a pair of car keys. After a few more minutes, the car that was perfect to arrive at the airport was in their driveway with South Africa and Somalia entering. Now, they had a long drive ahead of them to the nearest airport. A long, quiet drive with nothing but their thoughts.

Cape Town International Airport; 6:24 P.M.

The two countries were now waiting for their flight to Manhattan, New York, so they could attend the United Nations meeting they never thought would happen in their own lifetimes. “I can’t believe what’s going on… First, China’s manipulating everyone, now he’s causing nothing but tensions throughout the world? Soon enough, we’re gonna be hearing about Russia and North Korea’s relations strengthening into a global superpower relations rank,” Somalia said, looking at the news articles on his phone. “Yeah… It’s getting much, much worse ever since China’s population reached one billion,” South Africa replied. “And that’s mere because of the taxes in his own country. They’re high, and they’re giving him nothing but money to him and his government, yet he claims he cannot feed his own children nor his own brother. He also claims that the Hong Kong protests aren’t happening, even though protestors within his daughter’s own country have been getting beaten and arrested by Chinese police officers who work for China.” Somalia knew how serious the situation was getting, and what it could mean for the future of the world. Especially Africa. Most of the countries had some sort of trading route with China, but Somalia never knew if South Africa himself had ties with the communist. The PA System announced that their flight was boarding and the two stood up with their carry-on bags. “You got first class, right? I don’t want to be sitting next to a crying baby the entire flight,” Somalia said to his friend. “Of course I got first class. Who do you think I am, Central African Republic?” South Africa retorted, looking at Somalia. Somalia chuckled. “No, of course not. Besides, being rich is better than being poor. We can laugh in the faces of those poor imbeciles and watch their countries collapse into chaos, war, and even protests. Like Europe’s current condition,” the Somalian said, a proud grin on his face. South Africa fell silent as he boarded onto the plane. Sure, he was rich and kind of a snob, but that doesn’t mean he was rude and arrogant like many people thought he was. He always offered his help to the other countries of Africa, and even on other continents like Oceania and North America (even though North America didn’t really need his help anymore. Well, Mexico does but he prefers not to speak of it.) After they got situated on the flight, they were offered food and drinks, which the two politely declined for the first half of the flight. Oh, how they regretted it later. As they were flying over the Indian Ocean, they felt an unusual amount of turbulence. It caused people's carry-on bags to fall out of their compartments and spill all over the floor. “What’s happening?” Somalia asked nervously, looking at South Africa. “We have to jump out of this plane. It’s going down,” South Africa replied, only loud enough for Somalia to hear. Somalia was shocked as most people would be, but he nodded in agreement not a moment later, grabbing out the life jackets and raft from his carry-on bag. “I keep these on me at all times. I always come prepared,” Somalia said when South Africa looked at him weirdly. South Africa just nodded and they went to the back of the plane, opening the cargo door as some cargo fell into the Indian Ocean. “Push the life raft into the water after you get your life jacket on!” Somalia shouted over the roaring plane engines next to him and South Africa. They felt a jolt and the life raft suddenly fell out with Somalia still in it. “Somalia! Are you okay?” South Africa asked from the cargo door. “Yeah! I think,” Somalia replied. “Jump down! The boat’s drifting away too quickly for me to try and stop it with the ore!” Somalia then shouted up. South Africa took a running start and jumped into the life raft, landing on the boat safely. “Thank the Gods,” Somalia muttered. “You alright?” He then asked South Africa. “Yeah. I’m fine. What should we do now?”

“We wait until we see land. It’ll be a long, long drift to New York’s coast.”

“Okay. I understand.”

The two countries started their long journey to the United States coastal line. It would be a long, cold road ahead of them. But they had each other. For now.

Mexico City, Mexico; December 16th, 2019

Christmas was always hectic for Mexico. Of course, so was Mexico City, but that was normal for his capital. He had just gotten out of the local cafe shop when he was called by America. “Hola?” Mexico said as he answered. “USA, why are you calling me? Aren’t you busy with the current situation between you and OPEC?” America sighed. “I was, but then South Africa and Somalia washed up on New York’s shore. Now I have to take care of their injuries,” he replied.

“Let me guess; you called me so I could go over and take care of them while you deal with a possible third World War on your hands?”

“Yeah! That would be great! Could you come over right now if that’s possible?”

Mexico was a little concerned. He still had to finish wrapping gifts for his kids, and if he stopped, they could find them and it would no longer be a surprise. “USA, it’s almost Christmas! I cannot take care of them while I still have a family to care about!” Mexico said, clearly upset.

“Fine, fine, fine. When you’re done wrapping gifts, get over here. Or else I’m telling Argentina of what happened with you and Brazil,” America replied as he hung up. Mexico immediately knew he couldn’t let Argentina know how he actually broke his arm back in September. He quickly drove up to America’s border and got in, meeting America there.

“Wrapping gifts didn’t really seem that important after all, huh?”

“Oh shut it, you American idiot.”

Long Island, New York; 11:23 A.M.

“So what exactly happened? Do either of you remember anything?” Canada asked the two African countries. “I remember hearing that the plane was coming down, jumping out of the cargo door, and landing in this life raft,” Somalia replied. “Canadá, just give up already,” Mexico said, looking at the Canadian. “Somalia is the only one that can still be considered alive, whilst South Africa could die at any moment if we don’t get a blood transfusion in the next hour.” Canada just sighed, pulling a chair from the dining room table and sitting down, staring at the ground. “USA, you should call Switzerland. He’s the only doctor around for miles,” Greenland chimed in, looking at America. The American shrugged. “Does it look like I would have the number for that Swiss?” America said firmly.

“Well, isn’t he one of your closest allies, like that Italian?”

“What did you just say about Italy?!”

Canada grabbed America and made him sit down. “I know I have Switzerland’s number, so let me call him.” He then turned to America. “Don’t attack Greenland unless you wanna get on Denmark’s bad side. You know fully well how he can get if you attack his territory that is already beginning to melt because of your pollution.” He swiftly left the room, his snow boots clicking on the hallway floor as he dialed Switzerland’s number. “Hey, Switz? You got a moment or two?” The Canadian asked.

“Yes, why? Did America run out of medication?” Switzerland asked.

“No, no. America is fine. He’s been taking his BPD meds. It’s about South Africa. We found him and Somalia stranded on Long Island’s beach after New York called us, demanding we rush over there immediately.”

There was a moment of hesitation before Switzerland answered. “I’ll be right there,” he then said with a sigh. He then hung up.

Canada walked back out of the other room. “Switzerland is on his way. We can also assume that Austria might be brought over as well,” he said to the others. America visibly flinched at the mention of Austria, for Austria had been the person to approve of the oil heist. “I know you don’t want him to come, but I still want so save South Africa. He doesn’t deserve to die because of him trying to escape a crashing plane,” Canada then said. He then heard knocking and let Switzerland inside. “He’s upstairs in the guest room. Somalia is fine,” Mexico said to Switzerland, looking at him. Switzerland nodded, and Austria soon followed him upstairs. The Austrian felt America’s eyes on him the whole way. He was honestly nervous to be in the same house as someone whom he had tried to steal from. Now, they had to deal with not just the crisis, but two African countries found injured on American soil. That added more tension, and now European countries were beginning to get involved.

[letswritebangtan]

Love <3 | Jeon Jungkook

A/N: angst +fluff    office!au    jungkook x female!reader

“It was as if leaving was the only thing he knew how to do. 

“Can’t a man life his life?” he snapped. 

He never cared to stay. 

“Why do you do this?”

Love was in his heart, but it was fading. 

“I still love you, you know that right?” he pleaded.

And soon enough it was gone. 

You lifted the pillow from the bed, pulling it to your chest and shoving your face into the fabric so deep it didn’t bounce back. Your nails dug into the soft cloth nearly ripping it apart and you let out a painful cry. Then you cried for a few minutes. Then another scream elicited from your throat. It sounded muffled, but it was heard. 

Jungkook stood at the bottom of the stairs, worriedly glancing above every time he heard a heart wrenching sob. He bit his lip, trying not to let himself break into tears, but soon enough he failed. He did it. He fucked up. It wasn’t going to be fixed, it simply couldn’t be. 

So he left, with two hearts broken, one on each side of the door. 

And then it was a few years later, when you were finally out of your bubble. You could speak to people again, you could laugh again, smile again, you could be so carefree, something you never felt in ages. You were starting to be happy. 

Walking inside the office building, you smiled at the security who had opened the door for you. You greeted the receptionist, a few people that buzzed past you, and then you ran into Hoseok at the elevator. 

“Good morning, Seoks,” you chimed. 

He huffed, “y/n, I told you not to call me that. It sounds like you’re saying ‘sucks’ and it happens to sound like Seokjin which I do not want to be associated with.”

You laughed, “First of all, Seoks is a cute name, and who cares if people hear it wrong, you know what I’m saying, don’t you? Plus I have a different name for Seokjin.”

“I highly doubt his nickname is any better.”

“What’s wrong with Jinnie?” you asked offended. 

Hoseok shook his head and laughed, “Just get to work, y/n, Namjoon has been waiting for you all morning.” 

He ushered you into the elevator and followed in after you, pressing two buttons, one for his floor and one for yours. Once you got off at your floor, you bid him goodbye with the use of his nickname which made him scowl, and you laughed in amusement. You headed over to your desk and set your stuff down, then switched on the computer. You were taking out some documents from your drawer when your very flirtatious co-worker arrived just on time, just like he always did every day. 

“Morning beautiful,” he greeted with a smirk that soon turned into a smile that crinkled the corners of his eyes. 

“Good morning, Jimin. You’re early today,” you hummed, focusing back on your paperwork. 

“Only so that I could see you a little longer. If I’m late, the minutes I get to look at you wouldn’t be ideal now wouldn’t it?” he asked.

You rolled your eyes, smiling softly, “You really make my day you know that?”

“Of course, I’m Park Jimin. I make everyone’s day perfect as long as I’m around. Which is why I came to give you your early morning coffee,” he said handing you a Starbucks cup. 

“Jimin, you’re such a sweetheart, thank you. How much was it?” you said as you shuffled around to look for some change. 

“I buy you a coffee today, you buy me a coffee tomorrow,” he shrugged. 

“Is that your way of making sure I see you again?” you asked in amusement. 

“What’s an intelligent little thing like you doing working in a cubicle?” he joked, making you laugh. 

“Okay, shoo Jimin, I need to see Joon before he rips my head off,” you said. 

“Oh yeah, he’s in his office. He’s been wanting to see you since this morning. You better hurry your little bum on over there,” he said stretching his muscles out, making them flex slightly. 

Your gaze didn’t leave his body, and you were staring unconsciously. 

“Babe, no time for checking me out. Get to work,” he said seriously, but you could hear his mocking tone behind his words. 

You rolled your eyes, gathered your papers and gave his shoulder a pat before walking over to Namjoon’s office. You and Jimin weren’t actually a thing, nor did the two of you see each other as anything more than just friends. The two of you have been working this job together for nearly five years, and Jimin was the first good friend you made when you got here. He just had this flirtatious nature which he wasn’t afraid to show around people. But Jimin was only like this for the first few hours of the day. On certain days, or at certain times, you wouldn’t even want to cross his path, because angry and tired Jimin is the worst Jimin. But you being his best friend, you didn’t get offended by it, knowing he was just moody after a long day of work. 

Anyway, back to when you entered Namjoon’s office. He was sitting in his large, black chair, scribbling something onto his notepad. The moment he saw you he clicked off his pen and sat back. 

“Jeez, y/n, you take forever,” he huffed. 

“Hey, I start at nine in the morning, and I’m here and it’s nine in the morning,” you defended. 

“Yeah, but I had really exciting news and you know I hate keeping my mouth shut about exciting things,” he complained. 

“Yeah, which is why I never tell you my secrets,” you laughed. 

“You know, one day I’m seriously going to fire you,” he joked. 

“Well, then I guess I’ll never make you my famous samgyeopsal ever again,” you shrugged conveniently. 

“Ugh, whatever. Okay, now listen. I got a call yesterday, and it was this guy asking for a job here. And I told him that he shouldn’t be calling me, he should be asking for application forms at the reception. And he said this really convincing and moving speech that I had no response to so I just told him to forward me his details so that we could register him as an applicant. And then I saw his qualifications and god damn, y/n, he is a genius! He speaks very well, I’ve seen his video and photo work which was excellent and I was just really impressed by him. And I was thinking about the right place to put him at, then I remembered you telling me about how you needed a partner on your project to help you with images for your article, and boom, now you have a project partner,” he ended, smiling proudly. 

You sat there quite amazed with his entire story, and then you laughed at how accomplished he must have felt, because he looked really happy to finally let the news out. 

“That’s awesome, Joon. I’m really happy that you remembered. So tell me more about this guy, I want to know since I’ll be spending most of my time working with him,” you asked. 

“Actually, I asked him to come in today. He should be here soon-”

Coincidentally at that moment, someone knocked at the door and Namjoon smiled, signalling the person to come in. You turned around curious as to who it was, but the moment you saw the man who was now entering the office you felt your whole world collapse. 

“y/n, this is Jeon Jungkook. Your official project partner,” Namjoon introduced. 

You stared at Jungkook in shock, hurt and disbelief. He was looking at you with a surprised expression too. 

“Whoa, y/n, it’s been so long. I never expected to see you here,” he said smiling awkwardly. 

You didn’t reply immediately. You were still so taken aback by the situation, by his presence. The last time you saw him was six years ago, when he broke your heart. 

“Yeah,” you managed to croak out. “It has,” you mumbled, looking away. 

“You two know each other?” Namjoon asked interested. 

“Long story,” Jungkook said chuckling, but it wasn’t a happy one. 

“That’s great! I guess working on this project will be even easier for the two of you. Now get to work!” Namjoon said enthusiastically. 

You sighed and grabbed your phone from the table, walking out of Namjoon’s office and completely ignoring your ex boyfriend. You stomped to your desk and fell onto your chair, cursing softly. Why him? Out of the 7 billion human beings in the entire damn world, why did it have to be him? 

“So uh, where do I start?” he asked, standing next to you, but making sure to maintain a safe space. 

You bit your lip, not knowing what to say or do, or what to tell him. 

“Um, I’d like to see the shots you took of the elephants. We can start by picking out a few,” you said, not looking at him even once. 

“Oh, yeah sure. I’ll uh, need to use the computer though. I’ll just get another chair-”

“Use mine,” you cut him short. You were keeping this cold and ignorant tone with him, and Jungkook didn’t seem offended by it, he knew this was what he deserved. 

You got up from your chair and let Jungkook sit down, then crossed your arms and waited for the pictures to load. Jimin gave you a look from his desk to ask if you were okay and you nodded, smiling softly. He knew about what happened, only because the two of you got drunk and you blabbered all of your sorrows to him. 

“You might want to sit down, y/n. There’s a lot of content in here, you’ll just be hurting your neck looking at everything from up there,” Jungkook said, looking at you in concern, and then getting off the chair. 

You nodded briefly and sat down, skimming through all the pictures. You hate to admit it but Jungkook was amazing at what he did. It was no surprise to you that he was good in this field, he used to film and snap pictures whenever he could when the two of you were dating. You felt slightly uncomfortable that Jungkook was watching you over your shoulder, so you quickly got um and straightened out your dress shirt. 

“I’ll tell you what, why don’t you choose the best pictures? You’re the photographer, you know best. Plus I think they all look decent.” decent? lies they were amazing. 

Jungkook nodded understandingly, “Oh, okay then. I’ll pick a few and send them to you. Also, y/n, we might need to meet up tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow’s an off-day,” you countered. 

“Yes, but I want to get the pictures printed and talk to you about which colour contrasts you’d prefer. It does look different on paper after all,” he suggested.

“You need to get it printed by tomorrow?” you asked. 

“They’re having a discount period. I’ll be printing lots of stuff, like drafts and whatnot, it’ll be cheaper if we can get it tomorrow.”

You sighed, “Alright. So be it.”

“We can meet at the cafe down the street, i-if you’d like,” he stuttered. 

“Yeah, I don’t mind,” you shrugged. 

“Okay, great. I’ll uh, see you around,” he said waving awkwardly. 

You smiled tightly at him, and then went back to work. God this was going to be a nightmare. 

The next day, you were sitting at a table in the cafe waiting for Jungkook who was thirty minutes late. You knew he was going to screw things up again, just like he always did. Suddenly you heard the door open a little harshly and saw a panting and worried Jungkook searching the place for you. Once his eyes landed on your pissed off figure, he zoomed past the tables and plopped into the chair in front of you. 

“I am so sorry, y/n, there was an accident right outside my apartment and they didn’t move the vehicle until after an hour, so I waited twenty minutes and realised this wasn’t going to clear so I ran to the bus stop and took the bus to the nearest station and ran all the way here. I-” he paused to catch his breath.

“I know that’s no excuse but I really didn’t mean to be late. Thank you so much for waiting for me, honestly I didn’t think you’d still be here, but you are, and I, god, thank you for staying and I’ll make it up to you-” he rambled.

“Hey, hey, take it easy. Here,” you said handing him your glass of water. 

He paused for a moment to look at you, and then took the glass from your hands, downing its contents in one go. He sighed and licked his lips, looking at you again. 

“y/n, I really am sorry-”

“Jungkook,” you cut him off, laughing slightly. “It’s alright, really. You did the best you could, and you still got here despite everything. So it’s completely fine.”

He was still panting, but a little lesser. “Really?”

You nodded, and he sighed in relief. 

“Thank you,” he said.

You shook your head, “No need for thanks. So how about you show me the pictures?”

He nodded, “The pictures, right, so I have-”

Jungkook stopped mid sentence and literally froze for five seconds, and then whipped his head up to look at you, shock and worry in his gaze. 

“Oh my fucking god, I am the dumbest living thing, holy shit,” he cursed.

You frowned, “Is everything okay?”

He then looked at you, with that same gaze that he had when he arrived earlier. 

“y/n, I....you’re probably going to hate me but I-”

“You forgot them,” you finished his sentence. 

He bit his lip and winced slightly, “I may have.”

You leaned back in your seat, thinking. Jungkook looked at you worriedly. 

“Don’t tell Namjoon to fire me, please, I really really need this job, I promise I’ll do better just please, don’t fire me, y/n, I’ll do anything-”

“Jungkook,” you cut him off again. “It’s an off-day, and I didn’t really feel like working anyways, so, I’ll let it slide. But since we’re already here, you mind having a drink with me?”

Jungkook look flabbergasted. You? Asking him to have a drink? Together?

“Y-you’re okay with that?” he asked carefully. 

“I wouldn’t be asking you if I wasn’t,” you reasoned.

He nodded, “Y-yeah, I guess. But I thought that after what happened before you would have....”

He trailed off when he saw your eyes looking at him, slight amounts of sadness occupying them. 

“That was six years ago. We did some things, we made mistakes but we got over them,” you shrugged, as if you weren’t suffering then. 

“I guess, so, yeah. So, what would you like to drink? It’s on me,” he said standing up. 

“You sure you didn’t forget your wallet, too?” you joked. 

Jungkook made a ‘very funny y/n’ expression but then faltered slightly, checking his pockets and once he felt his wallet there he sighed in relief, making you laugh.

That laugh he hadn’t heard in ages. It melted his heart. 

And so you worked with Jungkook for the next few months, trying to come up with a good article with good pictures to accompany it. You were quite thankful that Jungkook and insisted on having a meeting at the cafe the other day, because that was they day that broke then tension between the two of you. You also realised a few things over the past few months with him. 

1. You were most definitely still in love with him.

2. He was nothing like he was before. He used to have a cold, unbothered attitude. Now, he was a total sweetheart.

3. The two of you haven’t actually fixed things between each other. But there was nothing wrong with the relationship the two of you had now, so there was no reason to bring the past up.

On the due date of your project, Namjoon decided to have you do a presentation about yours and Jungkook’s work basically to share your experience and encounters. You hated presentations though, they made you so nervous and fidgety and uncomfortable. Jungkook sensed this as the two of you were practicing your lines for the presentation. 

He placed his hand on your thigh softly, making you flinch in surprise as you looked up at him. 

“Are you okay?” he asked, carefully removing his hand. 

You nodded, “I guess.”

“y/n, our work was fantastic, even Namjoon said so. There’s nothing to worry about,” he tried to console you. 

“It’s not about how good our work is. I mean, well yeah, it kinda is but that’s not what I’m worried about,” you complained. 

“Then what is it?” he asked kindly. 

“I-I can’t do presentations. I stutter, or I mix up my words and sometimes I forget what I want to say and the embarrassment just haunts me,” you sighed. 

“Remember that presentation you did at college? The one for psychology?” he asked.

You raised an eyebrow, “Yeah, what about it?”

“Remember how great you were? The teacher wouldn’t stop complementing you for weeks, y/n!” he exclaimed. 

“Yeah well that was psychology and that was also college. This is work, an actual job, and I know Namjoon always jokes about firing me all the time but he actually can and will fire me if he needs to. I’m such a screw up-”

Before you could finish your sentence, Jungkook cupped your cheeks in his hands and held your face firmly, but not too hard. You gasped and looked at him in the eyes, and he was staring intently at you. 

“You are not a screw up, y/n. In fact, it’s me a who’s a screw up. I screwed up my life, I screwed up our relationship, I screwed up everything.”

You blinked as he let your face go, sighing deeply. He was looking down at the floor, something Jungkook doesn’t do very often. 

“I really am sorry, you know? For everything, for the way I treated you and just being this really shitty and horrible person. I hurt you so much and it kills me to even think that I was the reason behind all of those painful cries you let out that night.”

Your lips parted slightly in shock. “Jungkook,” you said softly. 

“I didn’t mean to hurt you, y/n. I loved you very much, so damn much, and I....I’m sure I still do. I was in a bad place. My parents were close to getting a divorce, and they were married but, they were seeing other people. It just pissed me off so much, I stopped believing in family, in relationships, I stopped believing in us. I lost all hope of everything, even our relationship. My parents splitting made me feel like relationships could never last, that’s why I was such a jerk to you. I was so young, and so stupid. I was so, so stupid to let you go. You did absolutely nothing wrong and yet I....”

“Jungkook you’re crying,” you mumbled sadly when he paused.

He smiled sadly, and wiped the tear rolling down his cheek. 

“Sorry, this is a little weird. I don’t know how it got to this,” he sniffled, quickly trying to regain his composure. 

You sighed, “Yeah, I agree you pulled of a real dick move, Jungkook but, I had no idea about your parents. You didn’t tell me anything, despite that fact that we were dating. I was just really confused, I was angry and I was so scared that it would end between us and when it finally did I was shattered. I really did love you too, but that was a long time ago. Like you said, we were young, we make mistakes. And I forgive you, because you really are so much different from the person you were before. I can see that you’ve changed, and you learned to trust people.”

“I trust you, y/n. I trust you, and I love you,” he said taking your hand. 

You inhaled sharply and looked at him. “I do too, Jungkook. I love you too.”

And then he kissed you. It had been six years since you felt his touch, his lips against yours, his entire being in front of you made you feel complete. Pulling away, Jungkook rested his forehead against yours and smiled. 

If he left, he returned.

“Never again,” he whispered.

And he cared enough to come back.

“I’m not going anywhere, neither are you,” he said. 

Love was in his heart, and it grew to swell.

“I love you too”

And love lasted as long as any true love. 

well this turned out pretty shitty :,)

like and reblog pretty pleasee <333

[kpopersanonymous]

GOT7: Seeing another member kiss their S/O (Jinyoung)

You were hanging out at the studio with BamBam and Yugyeom, waiting for your boyfriend to be finished with recording. Jinyoung had promised to finish early today so that you two could spend the evening together. You had even prepared a picnic basket full of his favorite foods that you two could share under the stars. Unfortunately, recording was taking longer than expected so Jinyoung sent out the maknaes to keep you company while you waited on him.

You giggled softly as you adjusted your flower crown on Yugyeom’s head as he posed for a selca, wanting to upload it on his social media. He motioned for you and BamBam to come closer and took a picture of the three of you, captioning it “Hanging out with my besties” and uploading it. Their fans knew you were best friends with GOT7 and loved you just as much as they loved the boys, even calling you the honorary member of GOT7. What the fans didn’t know, however, was the fact that you and Jinyoung have been dating for the better part of a year now. You two wanted to keep it a secret, fearing that you would get a lot of hate and your privacy invaded if word got out.

You were mindlessly scrolling through your Instagram, reading some of the nice comments the fans left you on your latest pictures when you heard BamBam speak up. “Do you guys want to do a vlive? Jinyoung-hyung might be in the recording studio for a little while longer and this could pass the time.” “Sure,” Yugyeom mumbled, not looking up from his phone. You closed your app, nodding in agreement.

BamBam started the broadcast as you and Yugyeom moved in closer to be in the shot. You began with some small talk with the fans while reading their comments, mainly consisting of hearts and “I love you”s. The three of you started laughing when someone mentioned how good Yugyeom looked in a flower crown, realizing that he was still wearing your accessory. He blushed as he placed it back on your head saying, “Thank you but it looks better on Y/N’s head, right guys?” You smiled shyly at all the sweet comments agreeing with the maknae.

The three of you chatted a little while longer when you notice the fans commenting your’s and BamBam’s ship name, something that had started trending a few months ago when a fan posted a photo of you two hanging out, coincidentally wearing matching sweaters. You had ignored the speculation of the fans, mainly because it wasn’t hurting your relationship with Jinyoung, who found the idea of you and BamBam dating to be hilarious. However, now you were growing uneasy reading through some of the comments, fans saying things like “BamBam and Y/N are so cute together!”, “#couple goals”, or “Yugyeom is totally third-wheeling them right now!”. You felt BamBam shift next to you, laughing nervously as he read the comments and you noticed that his arm was placed around your shoulder. You realized that the gesture must have been what started the comments as you tried to redirect the boys to the topic you were talking about earlier, but to no avail.

Yugyeom started to join in on the comments. “Yeah these two are real cuties aren’t they, ahgases?” he pinched your cheek, teasing the two of you. The fans agreed enthusiastically, asking you to do aegyo for them, causing you to blush like crazy. You and Bambam made a heart with his hand that was draped across your shoulder and your opposite hand, hoping that would satiate the fans. Unfortunately, that was like throwing gasoline into a fire. Comments quickly started rolling in, begging for more. Yugyeom just sat there, giggling in amusement as you and BamBam exchanged worried looks, knowing you had gone too far.

As you tried to think of something to say, Yugyeom chimed in. “Why don’t you two give us a kiss?” he proposed, asking the fans what they thought of the idea. You stared daggers at the maknae as BamBam released his grip on your shoulder to run a hand through his hair nervously. “I don’t think that’s such a good idea...” he started to say, trying to come up with an excuse. “Nonsense! Look, the fans LOVE the idea!” Yugyeom exclaimed, pointing at the screen filled with encouraging comments. You bit your lip as you turned shyly to BamBam, silently saying with your eyes “We should just get this over with”. You placed a sweet, gentle kiss on BamBam’s cheek before turning back to the screen to see the dozens of comments demanding a kiss on the lips. A blushing BamBam, stroking the spot where your lips had touched him, spoke up. “We gave you a kiss! Now can we please move on?” he asked, starting to get irritated. Yugyeom snatched the phone out of his hand to get a better shot of the two of you for the fans, saying, “That wasn’t good enough. Do it again. This time on the lips.” Now it was BamBam’s turn to stare daggers at the maknae before turning to you, an apologetic look in his eyes as he gently placed his hands on your cheeks, pulling you in for a sweet kiss. You heard a crash from somewhere nearby as you two parted, BamBam hastily ending the broadcast, hitting the cheerful maknae upside the head.

You straightened up as you heard a door opening, your eyes lighting up as you saw Jinyoung enter the room. You got up and headed towards him, arms spread out, inviting him in for a hug. He walked past you towards the exit, completely ignoring the three of you. You exchanged confused glances as you gathered up your things and chased after him, calling his name. You caught up with him and tried to lock arms with him, asking him if something was wrong. He continued to ignore you, shaking you off and picking up speed as he left the building and strode to his car.

You got into the passengers seat and turned to face him, a look of concern on your face as you examined his features, hoping to somehow find a clue to his strange behavior. His eyes were staring straight ahead at the parking lot, a mixture of anger and pain written on his face as you noticed his jaw clenched together and his knuckles turning white from the way he was gripping the steering wheel.

After what seemed like hours of silent treatment from his side, Jinyoung finally spoke up. “Get out,” he whispered, not taking his eyes off the sight in front of him. “Not until you tell me what’s wrong,” you told him. “Why don’t you go ask your boyfriend?” he growled bitterly. “Babe, you’re my boyfriend!” you exclaimed, growing even more confused. “Not according to the fans,” he muttered sadly to himself as a tear he had so desperately tried to hold back escaped.

Neither the tear nor the comment failed to escape your notice as you gently placed a hand on his arm, feeling him flinch at your touch but not pulling away. “I thought you didn’t care what the fans said,” you whispered softly at him. His eyes wandered to your hand as he answered, “Not when they demand the love of your life to kiss another member.” Now it finally dawned on you as to what caused this weird behavior. “You saw the vlive we just did,” you concluded. “Of course I did,” he said angrily. “You know I get notifications on vapp!!”

“Well what was I supposed to do?!” you asked, getting angry now yourself at the look of accusation and betrayal coming from your boyfriend. “Should I have just told them the truth? That we’re dating? You don’t know how the fans would react!” “Well I would rather have the fans know the truth and hate our relationship than have to watch you and BamBam be in a pretend relationship just to please them!” he shouted loudly, causing you to flinch at the rage in his voice, breaking contact with him.

He finally looked up at you, cursing at himself as he saw tears start to form in your eyes, ashamed at the way he just reacted. His features softened as he grabbed for your hands, not breaking eye contact with you. “I’m sorry,” he whispered sincerely. “I know I don’t let it show but I really hate the thought of you dating anyone else but me. It’s been eating me up inside ever since that ship name started trending.” “Well why didn’t you tell me?” you asked. “We usually tell each other everything.” “I didn’t want to pressure you into going public with me because I knew you were afraid of receiving hate from the fans,” he admitted.

He shifted, trying to find the right words to say before continuing. “But now I want to ask you to go public with me.” Your eyes grew wide at the request. You opened your mouth in response but Jinyoung placed a finger on your lips, silencing you. “Let me finish. I want to make our relationship public. I want to tell the ahgases how special you are to me and that I won’t tolerate any hate they show towards you. And neither will any of the other members. I will make sure you are safe.” He paused, a slight blush creeping on his cheeks. “And I want to be the only one to kiss you on vlive,” he added softly, smiling shyly at you, awaiting your response. You smiled brightly, pulling him into a deep, passionate kiss, unable to put into words how happy you were at this moment.

You parted after a few minutes, both of you breathing heavily. He bit his lip as he smiled at you. “I take it that’s a ‘yes’?” he assumed, pulling out his phone and taking a selca with you, uploading it to all his social media sites with the caption “Did I forget to introduce you guys to my girlfriend?? Oh well, better late than never!!”. You both laughed as Jinyoung started the car, driving to the destination of your date.

You mindlessly stroked his hand as a thought occurred to you. “Babe... Did you refer to me as the love of your life when we were arguing?” you asked. He scoffed. “I don’t know where you got that from, my love,” he teased, his eyes full of love as he looked at you.

Mark   Jaebum   Jinyoung   Jackson   Youngjae   BamBam   Yugyeom

[shou7]

Translation: I Want to Eat Your Pancreas by Yoru Sumino (Chapter 6)

Synopsis

One day, I - a high schooler - found a paperback in the hospital. The “Disease Coexistence Journal” was its title. It was a diary that my classmate, Sakura Yamauchi, had written in secret. Inside, it was written that due to her pancreatic disease, her days were numbered. And thus, I coincidentally went from Just-a-Classmate to a Secret-Knowing-Classmate. It was as if I were being drawn to her, who was my polar opposite. However, the world presented the girl that was already suffering from an illness with an equally cruel reality…

The best-selling, award-winning debut work by Yoru Sumino: “Bestsellers 2016 (Overall) by NIPPAN” - 4th Place “Bestsellers 2016 (Paperback Fiction) by NIPPAN” - 1st Place “Bestsellers 2016 (Overall) by TOHAN” - 5th Place “Bestsellers 2016 (Literary Books) by TOHAN” - 1st Place “Bookstore Grand Prix 2016” - 2nd Place “DA VINCI BOOK OF THE YEAR 2015” - 2nd Place “Bestsellers 2015 (Literary Books) by TOHAN” - 6th Place As of January 2017, this book has sold over 720,000 copies.

Please buy the book to support the author. (amazon.com)

Download the complete volume in PDF format here, or in ePUB format here.

(Chapter Index)

　

The girl had been hospitalised. The next time I saw her was Saturday that same week, in a hospital ward. The weather in the morning was cloudy, and the temperature pleasant. Having been informed of the visiting hours, I had come to pay her a so-called hospital visit, or rather, I had been summoned.

She was in a private ward. There weren’t any other visitors when I arrived. Dressed in a typical hospital gown with a tube hanging from her arm, was the girl facing the window doing some weird dance. When I called out to her from behind, she jumped up in shock and squealed noisily as she burrowed under her blanket. I sat down on the pipe chair that had been left beside the bed, waiting for the commotion to end. All of a sudden, she became quiet and sat back up on the bed as if nothing had happened. Her paroxysms knew neither time nor place.

“Don’t appear so suddenly, I was so embarrassed just now I thought I was going to die.”

“If you’re going to die in such an unprecedented manner, let me present you with something that’ll make you laugh for the rest of your life. Here, a visiting gift.”

“Huh, you didn’t have to! Ah, they’re strawberries! Let’s eat them. The plates and stuff are in the rack over there so go get them.”

Just as she had ordered, I retrieved two sets of plates and forks, as well as a knife, from the nearby white rack, and seated myself back on the chair. Incidentally, the strawberries had been bought with money my parents had given me after I’d told them I was going to the hospital to visit a classmate.

After removing the stems, I inquired about her condition as we ate the strawberries.

“It’s totally alright. The numbers were a bit weird, so my dad and mom were worried and fussing about getting me hospitalised, but I’m pretty much doing fine. I’ll be hospitalised for about two weeks, have some special drug inserted into my body, and after that I’ll be back in school.”

“By then it would already be summer vacation though.”

“Ah, that’s true. Then I’ve got to make plans for summer vacation with you huh.”

I looked at the end of the tube that extended from her arm. A bag containing transparent liquid hung from an iron pole that had casters attached. A single doubt came to mind.

“What did you tell others like Best-Friend-san, I mean, Kyouko-san?”

“I told Kyouko and the others that I had an appendix surgery. The hospital side is also covering it up for me. It looks like they’re quite worried for me, so it’s getting harder and harder to tell the truth y'know. What does Get-Along-kun, who pushed me down onto a bed a few days ago, think?”

“Hmm, I think you should properly tell Best-Friend-san, I mean, Kyouko-san one day though. But ultimately, I guess I should respect what you, who hugged me a few days ago, decide to do.”

“Don’t make me remember that! It’s so embarrassing! Before I die, I’m going to tell Kyouko about how you pushed me down, and then you’ll get killed without anyone knowing.”

“You’re actually going to turn your best friend into a criminal, the sin runs deep within you.”

“That said, what do you even mean by ‘Best-Friend-san’?”

“I refer to Kyouko-san as Best-Friend-san in my mind. In a familiar manner.”

“All I hear are formalities though. You mean it like ‘Section-Chief-san’, right?”

Appalled, she shrugged. She didn’t look the least bit different from how she usually did.

I had asked about her condition through our messages, but I was relieved to see that she really was doing fine. The truth was, I’d feared that the time of her death had suddenly been pushed forward. But as far as I could tell from looking at her, that didn’t seem to be the case. Her expression was bright and her movements were robust.

Having regained some peace of mind, I took out a newly bought, untouched notebook from my bag.

“Well then, now that you’re done with your snack, it’s time to study.”

“Whaaat, let’s just take it easy for a little longer!”

“I came here because you asked me to do this. Not to mention, you’ve already been taking it easy over here the entire time.”

Of course, there was a legitimate reason for me to come to the hospital apart from meeting her for the first time in a while. She had asked me to compile the materials taught during the supplementary lessons in the several days that she wasn’t going to school, and tutor her. She was shocked by how awfully honest I was when I promptly accepted her request. Honestly, how rude of her.

I handed her the new notebook, grabbed a pen, and imparted to her the summarised contents of the supplementary lessons. I cut out the parts I subjectively felt were fine not to remember, and gave an abridged lesson. She listened seriously for the most part. Including breaks, my mock lesson ended after about an hour and a half.

“Thanks so much, Get-Along-kun, you’re good at teaching huh, you should go become a teacher.”

“I don’t want to. And why do you only suggest jobs that will get me involved with humans?”

“I thought that maybe, in my stead, I’d have you do the things I actually wanted to do if I weren’t going to die.”

“If you say something like that, it’ll make me look bad for flat out refusing, so please stop.”

Giggling, she placed the notebook on the brown rack beside the bed. There were reading materials like magazines and manga lined up on its shelves. Surely, to an active human like her, this room must have been boring. After all, she was doing that weird dance earlier too.

It was late in the morning. Having been informed that Best-Friend-san was coming to visit around noon, I had meant to head home at 12 PM. When I told her about this, she gave me an invitation, “You could just join in the girls’ talk,” to which I politely refused. Playing teacher had left my stomach pretty empty, and more than anything, just confirming that she was fine had left me satisfied for the day.

“Then, before you go home - a magic trick, take a look at my magic trick.”

“Ooh, you’ve already picked it up?”

“Just a simple one. Though there are a couple others that I’m still working on.”

What she showcased was a magic trick that made use of poker cards. It was to - without looking - pick the card that the participant had chosen; I thought that it was well done given that she had learnt it in this short of a timespan. Since I had never studied magic tricks, I couldn’t understand the trick.

“I’m going to do an even harder one next time, so look forward to it!”

“I’ll look forward to it; maybe for your final magic trick, you should escape from a burning box.”

“You mean at a crematorium? That’s impossible you knooow.”

“Like I said, that kind of joke is-”

“Sakuraaa, you doin’ okay………… Wait, again?”

On reflex, I turned around to that lively voice. Best-Friend-san had entered the ward energetically, but her face twisted when she saw me. Recently, I’ve gotten the feeling that Best-Friend-san’s antagonistic attitude towards me was becoming increasingly obvious. At this rate, it didn’t seem like her wish for me to get along with Best-Friend-san after her death would become a reality.

I stood up from the chair, said my goodbyes, and proceeded to head home. Since Best-Friend-san was clearly glaring at me, I avoided letting our eyes meet. The animal programme last night had said it wasn’t good to look predators in the eye.

However, contrary to my wishful thinking for us to continue engaging in uninterrupted mutual avoidance, the girl on the bed suddenly remembered something outrageous, and blurted it out unfiltered.

“By the way, Get-Along-kun, what about Big Bro’s jersey and underwear that you borrowed?”

“Ah……”

I had never been so thoughtlessly cursed to this extent before. Today, though I had put her older brother’s clothes that I was lent into my bag, and had meant to return them, I had forgotten to do so.

However, there was nothing for me to say now.

I turned around, and saw the girl grinning, as a shocked expression surfaced on the face of Best-Friend-san, who had moved to the side of the bed. Trying my best to conceal my trembling, I retrieved a plastic carrier containing the set of clothes from my bag, and passed it to her.

“Tha~nks.”

Still grinning, she looked at both Best-Friend-san and me. I too, gave Best-Friend-san a quick glance. Perhaps I had a foolish desire to see something scary. Having recovered from the shock, Best-Friend-san was now glaring at me with eyes that could kill. Somehow, it felt as if she was roaring like a lion.

I immediately diverted my eyes away from Best-Friend-san, and quickly shuffled out of the room, hearing Best-Friend-san draw close to the girl and ask in an exceedingly low voice, “What do you mean by underwear?” So that I wouldn’t get dragged into something troublesome, I worked my feet faster and faster, further away from the room.

On Monday, the start of the following week, I headed to school and found that an extremely outrageous rumour about me had swept through the classroom.

Somehow, it seemed like it was a rumour about how I was stalking the girl. The one I heard about it from was the boy who would offer gum to me like it was an established custom. While I frowned at the nonsensical rumour, as expected, he offered me some gum while seemingly enjoying himself, to which I politely declined.

I tried to somehow deduce the origins of the rumours. Surely, somewhere along the way, there had probably been some number of sightings of the girl and I together, which had been then exaggerated into gossip that I was always around her. Having heard that, people who didn’t think well of me labelled me as a stalker in an act of ill-will, thus creating a rumour that was treated as if it were true - this was as far as my deduction got, but it may have still been nowhere near the truth.

Even if it didn’t come about in such a manner, I was still dismayed at how removed from reality the rumour was. As though some huge incident had occurred, almost every person in class was looking in my direction, whispering things like “there’s the stalker, better be careful”, having completely bought into the hearsay.

To say it once more - from the bottom of my heart, I was appalled. Just how could they accept so easily the views of the majority? Surely, if the thirty of them gathered together, they could probably kill a person without any hesitation. As long as one believed in their own righteousness, they could probably bring themselves to do anything. And all the while, they wouldn’t even realise that such a system was more machine than human.

That was why I thought that if the matter were to escalate, there would be an outbreak of bullying directed at me, but that was just me being overly self-conscious. To put it clearly, the one they were interested in was the girl, not me who was following after her.

No, I wasn’t even following after her. That was why, there was no benefit for them to take any action against me, and there was no need for me to do anything troublesome. But as for how Best-Friend-san would glare at me with interest - or perhaps just hostility – every day when I attended school, that was simply scary.

When I told her about the matter on my second visit on Tuesday, she burst out laughing, holding her pancreas.

“Kyouko, everyone, and Get-Along-kun are all interesting huh!”

“You’re the type that thinks talking behind people’s backs is amusing? What a horrible human.”

“What’s amusing is how everyone is getting involved with you - who they’ve never gotten involved with before - in a way that doesn’t make sense. And so, do you know how you got yourself into this sort of situation?”

“Isn’t it because I’ve been hanging out with you?”

“So you’re making it my fault? That’s not it though, it’s because you haven’t properly talked with everyone.”

She asserted while peeling mandarins on the bed.

“You see, they all don’t know Get-Along-kun’s character, so that’s why they’ve come to think like that. But clearing the mutual misunderstanding aside, I think you should try and get along with everyone.”

“I’m not going to do something that won’t benefit anyone though.”

It was something unnecessary for me, who would be alone once she was gone, and our classmates, who would forget about me without her around.

“I’m sure that once everyone knows more about you, they’ll properly understand that you’re an interesting person. Besides, I don’t think they really think badly of Get-Along-kun.”

While talking about foolish things and peeling mandarins, I thought of something.

“Apart from you and Kyouko-san, they don’t think of me as being anything but a ‘Plain-Classmate’.”

“Did you get that from asking the people themselves?”

She tilted her head to the side, as if she were striking at the core of my character.

“I didn’t ask. But I think that’s how it is…..”

“But you wouldn’t know that without asking the people themselves. Isn’t that just Get-Along-kun’s assumption? And that isn’t necessarily right.”

“It doesn’t matter if it is or isn’t right, after all, I’m not going to involve myself with anybody, and it’s nothing but my imagination, it’s just how I think it is. It’s an interest of mine to imagine what someone thinks of me when they call my name.”

“What’s with that self-absorption? Are you the self-absorbed sort of boy?

“Nope, I’m the prince of self-absorption that hails from the land of self-absorption. Show your respect.”

With an unamused face, she devoured the mandarins. I never thought of getting her to understand my system of values. She was the opposite sort of human from me after all.

She was a human that lived through getting involved with people. Her expressions and character had stories behind them. In contrast to that, all my human relationships outside of my family existed only within my head. It didn’t matter if I were liked or disliked as long no harm came to me - I’d been living with such thoughts. From the very beginning, I’d already given up on getting involved with people. As the opposite of her, I had no need for the humans around me. Though if asked whether that was fine, I’d just be troubled.

Having finished eating the mandarins, she carefully folded the peels together and tossed them at the trash can. The ball of skin sailed splendidly into the can, and just with that trivial event, she happily punched her fist into the air.

“By the way, what do you think I think of you?”

“Who knows, isn’t it something along the lines of ‘we get along’?”

At my appropriate response, she pouted.

“Bzzz, wrooong answer. Though I did think that before.”

I tilted my head to the side at the peculiar girl’s phrasing. She had thought that - in other words, it probably meant that her way of thinking hadn’t changed to that of others’, but she noticed that her own way of thinking was off the mark. Just a little, it interested me.

“Then, what do you think of me now?”

“If things like this were revealed, then human relations wouldn’t be interesting anymore. It’s because humans have no idea what they are to others that friendship and love are interesting y’know.”

“Like I thought, that’s how you think huh.”

“Huh? Have we talked about this before?”

Probably having really forgotten, she brought her eyebrows together, looking mystified. That expression was strange, and so I ended up laughing. I looked at myself, who had always been like an outsider, smiling honestly at someone. I was doubtful that I had become this sort of person without realising, but on the flip side, I felt that it was so. The one that made me like this was, without a doubt, the girl before my eyes. Though no one could know whether that was a good or bad thing. But regardless, I had changed quite a bit.

Looking at me smiling, she narrowed her eyes.

“I want to show everyone that ?????-kun is a really good person.”

Her voice was gentle. So she had the gall to say that sort of thing to the boy that had pushed her down. Though this probably meant that I’d regret doing that for the rest of my life.

“Everyone aside, you should go and tell Kyouko-san. She scares me.”

“I’m just saying but - that girl, she cares about her best friend, so that’s why she thinks you’re deceiving me.”

“Then I guess there’s a problem with your ability to communicate information huh. Even though Kyouko-san seems like she has a good head on her shoulders.”

“Hm, what, you’re showering Kyouko with praise. Are you thinking of fooling around with Kyouko after I die? Even I’m shocked.”

I devoured a mandarin segment as I looked back at her overreaction with an unamused face. She reseated herself on the bed seemingly disinterested, making me smile again.

“Well then, so for today’s magic trick…”

What she had picked up this time was how to make it look like the coin in her palm could disappear and reappear at her will. I got caught up in the programme, and similar to the previous trick, I thought it was excellent for a beginner. To me, who didn’t know anything, it just about made me think that she perhaps had an exceptional talent for this.

“Well I’ve been practicing the entire time after all! Since I don’t have time y’know.”

Wasn’t it because she had time that she was able to practice? I was about to politely insert such a jab, but I let it go to let her know that I wasn’t generous with jokes.

“If it’s like this, you really might become amazing after a year huh.”

“Hm, well, I guess!”

She had made a weird pause. Perhaps it was because she minded having her joke ignored. Since it couldn’t be helped, I honestly praised her hard work and its outcome. Spirits lifted, she smiled.

With that, my second hospital visit to her ended without any problems.

The problem arose for me alone on the way home from the hospital.

For me, the place that I would say I liked most in this world were bookshops, and so, on this day too, I had dropped by a bookshop on the way home from the hospital. Inside the store with an overworked air-conditioner, I browsed through its books. Fortunately, I hadn’t brought along the girl whom I would end up making wait, so there was no problem no matter how much time I wanted to spend here.

I didn’t have anything that I could be proud of, but I was confident in just my ability to concentrate while reading books. For example, if I wasn’t offered gum, or if the sound of the chime embedded within my body doesn’t ring, I could probably continue blocking out everything around me forever, reading a book in my own little world. Were I a wild herbivore, I’d surely daydream about other worlds without noticing any predators nearby, and end up getting eaten right away.

That was why, once I finished reading a short story within a paperback in one go, and returned to this world that would deprive a girl of her life through an illness, I realised it at long last.

There was a lion standing beside me.

I jumped up in shock, taken aback. With a large bag hanging from her shoulder, she was looking at the open book in her hands. But I could tell that she was clearly out to get me.

Perhaps, I could keep my footsteps silent, leave this place, and escape. But those fleeting hopes of mine were dashed right away.

“What do you think of Sakura?”

Behind that one line Best-Friend-san gave without any greeting or preamble, there was a force that seemed like it would chew me up if didn’t answer correctly.

I felt cold sweat drip down my back - I was stuck. Just what could the right answer be? But, when I thought about it, I realised something. With regard to that question from Best-Friend-san, everything but my feelings towards that girl was clear. I didn’t choose any path other than answering frankly with that truth.

“I don’t know.”

In the several seconds of silence that followed, I couldn’t be sure whether Best-Friend-san was at a loss, or hardening her resolve to kill, but by the time I realised it, my arm had been caught in the claws of the lion. Forcefully pulling me close to the point that I staggered, she spoke in an intimidating tone of voice.

“Even though that girl’s the way she is, she gets hurt more easily than others. So stop getting close to that girl with half-baked feelings. Because if she gets hurt ‘cause of that, I’ll kill you.”

I’ll kill you - it was different from the inconsequential threats elementary schoolers and middle schoolers made against their enemies, it was meant as a serious proclamation of her intentions to me. I shuddered.

Without saying anything more than that, Best-Friend-san left, leaving me desperately trying to somehow calm the beating of my heart that was rampaging throughout the bookstore. In the end, I was unable to leave that spot until I was offered gum by that classmate who just happened to enter the bookstore.

Just what did I think of that girl? That night, I tried seriously thinking about it.

But, as expected, I couldn’t even figure out anything close to an answer.

The day after I was almost preyed on, I suddenly received a message from the girl inviting me over. The last two times, I had been contacted a day before each visit, so this was something unusual. I thought that something had happened, but that wasn’t the case at all. As soon as I arrived, she began speaking with a resolute smile.

“Won’t you help me escape from the hospital?”

The girl had just wanted to unveil the mischief she’d thought of to me right away.

“I don’t want to, I still don’t want to turn into a murderer.”

“It’s fine, everyone will forgive you for breaking out a dying lover from the hospital who ends up dying midway, since it was an agreement.”

“According to your logic, wouldn’t it be forgivable even if I poured boiling water onto someone if they said to do so?”

“Huh, wouldn’t it?”

“It wouldn’t. It’s just normal physical assault. That’s why something like breaking you out of the hospital - do it with a lover that doesn’t mind shortening your lifespan.”

“Tsk,” looking like she was seriously quite disappointed, she twirled a rubber hairband on her finger. I was surprised. Could it be that she was actually thinking of having me take actions that would put her sickly self in danger? And then I got a shock. Even as a joke, she was actually suggesting foolish actions that would put what little remained of her own life in danger.

Or perhaps, it wasn’t a joke. I looked at her smiling face that was the same as always, and I got a sense of unease which felt like it would melt away and disappear at any moment.

After which, at her suggestion “well then, let’s get out of the ward”, we headed for the store on the third floor together. So that the tube protruding from her right hand would not be ripped out, she walked in front of me, carefully carrying the pouch of medicine with something that looked like a mic stand. Seeing her like this, she brought to mind the image of a sick person. That was what I thought.

On the sofa close to the store, while eating ice cream beside me, she began speaking. I didn’t understand why she suddenly brought up a topic like that.

“Hey, do you know why sakura bloom in spring?”

“You mean, yourself? In that case I don’t understand what you mean.”

“That’s not it, have I even once referred to myself by my own name? C-could it be, you, with another woman called Sakura…… So you were the unfaithful sort of man huh, wouldn’t it be better if you just died?’

“Stop trying to drag me along just because it seems like you’ll have nothing to do in heaven. That’s right, by all means, you should just have your funeral held on Tomobiki, Friend-Pulling Day.”

“No way, I want my friends to live, so that’s no good.”

“Then could you write down on some foolscap the reason you think it’s fine if I died, and submit it to me? So, about the reason sakura bloom in spring. Isn’t it just because it’s that sort of flower?”

I said the most sensible thing, and she laughed through her nose like she was genuinely dumb. I barely controlled myself from thrusting the lemon-flavoured ice candy I had in hand at her nose.

Seemingly having read my bad mood, she laughed frivolously, and explained the part she was trying to get at.

“I’ll tell you. After the sakura have scattered, the next generation of flower buds actually sprout in about three months. But they continue to slumber. They wait for it to become warm, and then they all bloom at once. In other words, sakura wait for the right time to bloom. Isn’t that wonderful?”

I heard what she had to say, and I thought that she was perhaps projecting a little too much intention onto the characteristics of a flower. It just waits for the pollen-carrying insects or birds - maybe both. However, I didn’t make that retort. As for why, it was because I had arrived at another opinion from a different perspective.

“I see, it’s really a perfect fit for your name.”

“Because they’re pretty? Aww, you’re making me blush”

“……It’s not like that, I just thought that the name of the flower that choses to bloom in spring was a perfect name for you, who thinks that meetings and happenings aren’t coincidences, but choices.”

After momentarily drawing a blank at my opinion, a smile broke on her face, and she said, “Thanks!” Perfect in this case was the same as suitable - it wasn’t meant as a compliment, so I couldn’t understand why she looked that happy.

“?????-kun’s name suits you pretty well too you know.”

“……I wonder.”

“After all, you’re: Someone who’s. Helping. Ill-fated me.  Get.  Along.”

She made that joke, proudly laughing while pointing back and forth between herself and I.

When I heard those words, I sped through all of our conversations up till now, and once again thought that something about her today really was weird.

She was nibbling at a watermelon popsicle, and just like always, it appeared as if she would continue to live forever. That hadn’t changed, and yet somewhere in her joke I could hear it - yes, it was as if it were the last day of summer vacation and she was frantically searching for something she hadn’t already done.

What happened?

That was what I wondered at the bottom of my heart. However, I didn’t ask her about it because I thought the fleeting impatience I saw inside of her was only natural. She had only a year left to live. To begin with, it should have been stranger for her to have been so easy-going about it.

That was why on that day, I decided to treat the sense of unease I got from her as an extremely trivial matter that was born merely from my own subjectivity.

I thought that it was the right thing to do.

　 

In spite of that, when I was next called down to the hospital ward on Saturday morning, the slight sense of unease I had felt showed its form right before my eyes.

When I entered the room at the designated time, she noticed my presence right away, and smiled as she called my name. But that smile was a little awkward.

It were as if she had meticulously drawn that vivid expression on her heart, and that let slip her anxiety. Subconsciously, I could feel that something was off.

I coaxed my cowardly feet forward, and sat down on the same pipe chair as usual. With a determined expression, she said something that didn’t differ from what I had come to expect.

“Hey…… ?????-kun.”

“……Yeah, what’s the matter?”

“Just one time is fine so-”

While she said that, she grabbed the poker cards that had been left on the rack.

“Truth or Dare - won’t you play it with me?”

“…………What for?”

A suggestion to play the devil’s game. Even though it looked like I could have immediately refused, I wanted to know why she would suddenly bring up something like that, and more than anything else, I was curious about her washed-out appearance.

Since she couldn’t answer right away, I continued speaking.

“So this means you have something you want to ask me no matter what, or something you want me to do no matter what huh. Or maybe, something that I’d decline if you asked norma-”

“It’s…… Not like that. You would probably tell me normally, but I’m unable to get myself together to ask, so I’m thinking of just leaving it up to luck.”

Just what in the world was she being so awfully ceremonious about that she was unable to articulate it? I wasn’t aware of keeping any secrets that would trouble her.

The girl gazed into my eyes. It was as if she was trying to get her strong will to push through. Mysteriously, her eyes erased any intention I had of defying her. It was because I was a reed boat. Or perhaps, it was because it was her who I was facing.

After some thought, I ended up making this sort of decision:

“……You did lend me a book after all. If it’s just one time, I’ll play along.”

“Thanks.”

She said just one word of gratitude, looking like she knew my answer beforehand, and began to shuffle the cards. As I thought, she was acting strange. She usually had a habit of saying unnecessary things like it was her livelihood, but today, she was speaking without adding any superfluous words. Wondering just what in the world had happened to her, curiosity and concern turned into yoghurt inside my heart.

The rules for Truth or Dare were the same as before. Since we were only playing one round, we took turns shuffling the cards five times each, then placed the stack on the bed for us to draw a card from wherever we liked.

After she went through a lot of trouble to pick one from a little beneath the middle, I took the first card from the top. Since their faces were obscured, we didn’t know where each card had ended up, so there wasn’t anything like a difference in the values between the cards we choose. Furthermore, I wasn’t as invested in this game as she was. She’d probably get angry if I said something like this, but this time, I’d have been fine with either winning or losing. If the match were to be decided based on the gap in fighting spirit and willpower, if the gods had created such a setting in this world, it was without a doubt her victory.

She’d probably say it – that it was interesting because it wasn’t like that.

We flipped over the cards at the same time, and she made a face that seemed to show heartfelt frustration.

“Waaah, this is, a complete defeat.”

She gripped onto the bedcover, like she was waiting for her disappointment to run off. I, who ended up winning, could do nothing but look on. Before long, she noticed my gaze and threw her disappointment away somewhere, breaking out into a smile.

“Can’t be helped huh! It’s just the way it is! That’s why it’s interesting!”

“…………I see, so it’s no good if I don’t think of a question huh.”

“It’s fine, I’ll answer whatever you want y’know? Do you want to hear about my first kiss, maybe?”

“I’m not going to spend this valuable right on that sort of question with a worth lower than an elevator.”

“……Elevators have their own worth though?”

“And so? What of it? Did you actually think I said something meaningful?”

With high spirits, she burst into laughter. Looking at her laughing, it made me think that perhaps it was just me overthinking she was different from normal. This time too, and the last time I came to the hospital as well - maybe there was no significant basis for the difference in her appearance. Any little thing could have caused her expression to change, like alcohol or the weather - those kinds of insignificant reasons. Yes, that was what I hoped.

I, who gained a right in the midst of my reluctance, wondered. What should I ask the girl? The interest I had in the girl hadn’t changed from when we last played this game. How in the world did a human like her come to be? Actually, there may have been one or two things that I was more curious about. For example, what she thought of me.

However, I didn’t have the courage to ask her those one or two things. A human like me came to be from cowardice - being with her made me realise that. I was like the reverse of the courageous girl.

I looked at her as I pondered over what to ask her. She was staring in my direction, in anticipation of a question. The girl that was seated quietly on the bed, just a little more than before, looked like she was dying.

Wanting to shake of that feeling, I decided on my question which simultaneously left my mouth.

“To you, what does it mean to live?”

“Waaah, you’re actually being serious about this.” After poking fun at me, she made a contemplative face and stared at the sky, thinking. “To live, huh,” she muttered.

With just that, I could tell that she was staring not at death but at life, and with just that - though it was by a miniscule amount - I felt my heart becoming lighter. I was a coward. I already knew, but somewhere inside me, I still couldn’t accept that she was going to die.

I recalled how distraught I’d become looking inside her bag in the hotel during the trip, and how she’d cornered me with her final question that day.

“Yeah! That’s it! I got it!”

She pointed upwards with her index finger, indicating that she had reached a conclusion. So that I wouldn’t miss any of her words, I perked up my ears.

“What it means to live, you see-”

“…………”

“Is surely the connecting of our hearts with someone else’s. Working towards that is what we call living.”

……Aah, I understand now.

Having realised it, I got goosebumps.

That which was referred to as her existence, through her gaze and voice, the heat of her will, and the trembling of her life - I realised that it made my soul quake.

“Acknowledging someone, getting to like someone, getting to hate someone, enjoying being together with someone, detesting being together with someone, holding hands with someone, hugging someone, and growing apart from someone. That, is living. If we were all alone, we wouldn’t know that we exist. I, who hates someone despite liking someone else, who enjoys being together with someone despite detesting being together with someone else - I think it’s because of those kinds of relationships that I have with people that I - not someone else - am living. I have a heart because everyone exists, and I have a body so that I can be touched by everyone. Right now, I, who was formed in such a manner, am living. Right here, I am still living. That’s why there’s meaning in people being born. Through our own choices, right now, right here, you, and me as well, are living.”

“…………”

“……Well, I did end up getting pretty heated, but was this actually an episode of Serious Teenage Forum?”

“Nope, this is a hospital ward.”

I answered exceedingly curtly. She puffed out her cheeks.

I hoped that she would let it go, since I didn’t mean for it to come out like that.

“…………”

“?????-kun……?”

This time, while listening to her words, for the first time, I was able to discover my true feelings that had accumulated at the deepest depths of my core. It was right beneath my nose by the time I realised, but despite having become a part of my heart itself, it was something that I hadn’t noticed till now. It was because I was a coward.

The answer that I had been seeking these past few days - no, actually forever - was now right there.

That’s right, I……you.

I had been suppressing those words, so it took my all.

“…………Really.”

“Ah, you’ve finally started talking again, what’s up? ?????-kun.”

“You’ve, really been teaching me a lot of things.”

“Wah, what’s this all of a sudden, it’s embarrassing.”

“It’s how I really feel. Thank you.”

“Are you running a fever?”

She placed her palm on my forehead. But naturally, since the temperature was normal, she tilted her head to the side. Or rather, did she really, seriously think that I was running a fever? Finding that amusing, I ended up laughing. Seeing such a sight, she once again pushed her palm towards me. I laughed again. And the cycle repeated itself.

Aaah, I was having fun. It’s because she was here.

Once she finally understood that I wasn’t running a fever, I gratefully suggested having the diced pineapples that I had bought for her.

Having said during the last hospital visit that pineapple would be good for my next visit, her face seemed to blossom with happiness.

While the two of us were enjoying the pineapples, she let out a sigh.

“A~ah, I don’t have any luck either huh.”

“For Truth or Dare? That’s true, but even if we weren’t playing the game, if it’s a question that I can answer, I’ll answer it for you.”

“It’s fine, since that’s just the outcome of the game.”

She had flatly refused. As before, I still hadn’t the slightest clue what she had wanted to ask.

Once we were done eating the snacks, I taught her the new material that had been discussed during the supplementary lessons, and then the customary magic trick presentation began. Since not much time had passed since the last visit, this time she did something simple using the magic props. As usual, I, who didn’t have a profound knowledge of magic, was honestly impressed. Even during our studying time and our magic trick time as well, I - who didn’t realised my own heart until just a little while ago - was looking only at her.

“Well then, it’s about time for me to go home. My stomach’s getting empty too after all.”

“Huh! You’re going home already?”

She thrashed about in protest like a child. Perhaps she dreaded the boredom of being alone in a hospital ward much more than I had thought.

“Isn’t it about time for you to have lunch? Besides, I don’t want to get devoured by Kyouko-san for lunch.”

“Pancreas too?”

“Maybe so, huh.”

I stood up while imagining myself getting preyed on by a carnivorous animal, and she cried out, “Hold on!”

“Hold on for a little longer - well then, I still have one last request.”

She beckoned me closer with a gesture of her hand. I approached her without the least bit of caution, and looking like she hadn’t any ill will or reservation or ulterior motive or hidden agenda or second thoughts or responsibility, she stretched out her upper body and embraced me.

I forgot the shock I had in response to her absolutely unexpected actions. Calm to the point that even I was surprised, I rested my chin on her shoulder. Sickly sweet.

“……Hey.”

“This is different from the other day y'know, this isn’t mischief.”

“…………Then, what?”

“Recently I’ve just strangely begun liking people’s body heat!”

I had a conviction of sorts about the manner in which she was speaking.

“Hey, the truth is it’s always been on my mind but-”

“My three sizes? Since my chest is pressing against you.”

“Are you sure you aren’t dumb?”

“Hahaha.”

“It’s about how you’ve been acting a little strange. Did something happen?”

Still in an embrace, no, to be accurate, still being wilfully embraced by her, I waited quietly for her answer. Unlike before, I didn’t think I was being made a fool of, rather, I thought that if she was fine with something like my body heat, she should just use it if she wanted to.

She slowly shook her head from side to side twice.

“……Nope, no~thing at all!”

Naturally, I didn’t believe that. But, I didn’t have the courage to get her to say what she didn’t want to say.

“It’s just that, I wanted to taste the truth and everyday life that you’ve been giving me.”

“…………I see.”

Well, even if I did have outrageous courage, and even if I didn’t, by this time, I was unable to do anything about not understanding the inside of her heart.

I really was forsaken by that thing known as timing.

While she was still silent, I heard the roar of a beast from behind me.

“Sakuraaa, good mor…… What, you….. Unforgivable!”

I pushed her away onto the bed, and while hearing her “kyaa”, I looked over my shoulder to find a classmate glaring at me with the face of the Devil. Even I couldn’t bring myself to look away. Best-Friend-san was slowly making her way towards me, and thinking of escaping, I moved backwards, but the bed blocked the way.

When Best-Friend-san was finally about to grab a hold of my collar, I received help from the one that probably should have been resting no matter what the circumstance. The girl quickly got off the bed and tightly hugged Best-Friend-san.

“I’ll calm Kyouko down, so-!”

“Ah, then, bye!”

Having been made to - or rather - in order to escape from Best-Friend-san, I left the ward. I was always running away whenever she arrived. Finally, as I masterfully ignored Best-Friend-san loudly screaming my name, my third visit came to an end. It felt like her sickly sweet scent still lingered on my body.

Just like I had expected - or perhaps I shouldn’t say it in such a manner, since I hadn’t actually gotten a clear idea about what had happened, but - the next day, on Sunday night, I received a message from the girl, and I learnt the truth behind the matter which she seemed to have been hiding that day.

The duration of her hospitalisation had been extended two weeks longer than planned.

　

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